CH I IDREN 


WOODS  HUTCH  IN  SON 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 
AT  LOS  ANGELES 


GIFT  OF  CAPT.  AND  MRS. 
PAUL  MCBRIDE  PERIGORD 


0HIVBRSITY  of 

AT 

LOS  ANGELES 
LIBRARY 


WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 


WE  AND 
OUR  CHILDREN 


BY 
WOODS  HUTCHINSON,  A.  M.,  M.  D. 

Author  of  "Instinct  and  Health"  "Preventable  Diseases" 

"The  Conquest  of  Consumption,"  "Exercise 

and  Health,"  &c.,  Vc. 


GARDEN  CITY        NEW  YORK 

DOUBLEDAY,  PAGE  &  COMPANY 

1913 


136514 


ALL   RIGHTS   RESERVED,  INCLUDING  THAT  OP  TRANSLATION 
INTO  FOREIGN   LANGUAGES,  INCLUDING  THE   SCANDINAVIAN 

COPYRIGHT,  IQ08,  IQOg,  BY  SUCCESS  COMPANY 
COPYRIGHT,  IQ08,  igio,  BY  CROWELL  PUBLISHING  COMPANY 
COPYRIGHT,  igio,  BY  PHELPS  PUBLISHING  COMPANY 
COPYRIGHT,  IQII,  BY  CURTIS  PUBLISHING  COMPANY 
COPYRIGHT,  IQII,  BY  INTERNATIONAL  MAGAZINE  COMPANY 


COPYRIGHT,  IQII,  BY  DOUBLEDAY,  PAGE  &  COMPANY 


ur 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGB 

Introduction vii 

I.     Before  the  Little  One  Comes 3 

II.     Babies  as  Bulbs IO 

III.  The  Nursery  Age 24 

IV.  The  Sweet  Tooth 52 

V.    The  Kindergarten  Age 74 

VI.     Feeding  the  Human  Caterpillar 79 

VII.     Our  Ivory  Keepers  of  the  Gate 103 

VIII.    The  Child's  Self-Respect 133 

IX.     Brick  Walls  and  the  Growing  Child 155 

X.     Eyes  and  Ears 186 

XI.    The  Worship  of  the  Race  Stream 210 

XII.     Reluctant  Parentage 249 

XIII.  The  American  Mother 270 

XIV.  The  Delicate  Child 307 

XV.     Fiction  as  a  Diet 339 

XVI.     Overworked  Children  on  the  Farm  and  in  the  School  362 


INTRODUCTION 

THIS  world  is  a  nursery,  not  merely  for  im- 
mortal souls,  but  for  flesh  and  blood  babies. 
Growth  is  its  business,  growth  the  only 
thing  that  it  insists  upon.  After  we  have  done  our 
own  growing,  our  chief  excuse  for  further  existence 
is  to  make  our  babies  grow.  Grown-ups  could  get 
along  in  tree-tops  and  in  caves,  but  for  the  shelter 
of  the  child  houses  had  to  be  invented.  There  was 
only  one  room  in  the  primitive  house  and  that  was 
the  nursery.  And  the  modern  one  ought  to  be 
run  on  the  same  plan.  Cities,  on  the  other  hand, 
were  made  to  huddle  in  for  shelter  against  enemies, 
or  to  do  business  in.  Now  the  most  urgent  demand 
of  thoughtful  lovers  of  their  kind  is  that  they  should 
be  made  places  to  grow  children  in.  And  the 
community  would  profit  just  as  much  by  such 
a  change  as  the  children  would.  Any  place  which 
is  not  fit  to  rear  a  child  in  is  not  fit  for  a  man  or  a 
woman  to  live  in. 

The  more  thoughtfully  we  consider  our  children 
the  more  deeply  we  will  benefit  ourselves.  That 
one  phrase,  "and  a  little  child  shall  lead  them," 
sums  up  the  millennium.  The  child  not  only  has 


viii  INTRODUCTION 

a  right  to  the  best  that  is  in  us,  but  will  bring 
out  the  best  that  is  in  us.  The  race  has  made  us 
what  we  are  —  the  child  is  the  embodiment  of  the 
race,  and  the  debt  that  we  owe  to  the  race  we 
pay  to  him.  The  highest  debt,  the  most  sacred 
obligation  that  any  community  owes,  is  to  its  chil- 
dren. If  business  interests  must  suffer  in  order 
that  the  child  may  be  provided  with  pure  food, 
then  they  must  suffer.  If  the  growth  of  our  cities 
will  be  interfered  with  by  insistence  upon  play- 
grounds and  breathing  spaces  and  well-lighted 
houses  and  homes,  then  it  must  be  interfered  with. 
No  matter  what  tax  upon  property  is  necessary 
to  provide  schoolhouses  and  parks  and  play- 
grounds, and  a  fair  start  in  life  for  every  child,  it 
must  bear  it. 

After  all,  these  things  are  but  the  small  dust  of 
the  balance  compared  with  the  child.  It  was  the 
child,  in  fact,  and  his  care,  that  started  us  upward 
from  savagery  and  has  kept  us  from  falling  back 
into  it  ever  since.  Only  in  educating  and  training 
and  improving  its  children  can  the  race  educate  and 
train  itself.  All  honour  to  old  age  and  to  authority, 
but  it  is  the  honour  paid  the  child  and  the  mother 
that  stamps  the  rank  of  a  civilization!  Not  only 
what  the  race  will  be  in  the  next  generation,  but  what 
it  is  in  the  present,  depends  upon  its  treatment  of 
its  children.  Run  your  house  in  the  interests  of 
your  children,  run  your  business  and  see  that  every- 


INTRODUCTION  ix 

body  else  runs  his  business  in  the  interests  of  your 
children.  Run  your  politics  and  your  government 
in  the  interests  of  your  children,  and  the  world  will 
become  a  Utopia  within  three  generations.  No 
sacrifice  is  too  great  to  make,  no  sum  too  large  to 
demand,  for  the  proper  and  intelligent  care  of  chil- 
dren. That  class  of  investments  will  return  .fifty 
per  cent,  every  year,  good  or  bad. 

The  supreme  test  of  a  civilization  is  the  sort  of 
men  and  women  it  breeds,  and  the  time  to  influence 
men  and  women  for  better  or  for  worse  is  in  child- 
hood. It  costs  far  more  to  raise  and  educate  a  child 
than  it  used  to;  but  if  we  are  getting  a  better  child 
for  our  money,  it  is  money  well  spent.  What  else 
are  we  here  for? 

And  we  must  spend  more  than  money  on  our 
children  —  we  must  spend  ourselves  and  our  time. 
It  is  not  enough  simply  to  provide  a  good  house  and 
plenty  of  food  and  substantial  clothing. 

It  is  a  particularly  good  thing  for  a  child  to  have 
two  parents,  one  of  each  kind.  We  fathers  are  too 
apt  to  echo  piously  the  Hindu  proverb:  "God  could 
not  be  everywhere,  so  he  made  mothers,"  and  con- 
sider that  we  have  done  our  duty  when  we  have 
provided  a  place  and  means  for  our  wives  to  take 
care  of  our  children.  Not  only  do  we  regard  it  as 
a  waste  of  time  to  take  an  hour  or  a  half  day  from 
our  Sacred  Business  and  devote  it  to  the  personal 
care  of  our  children,  but  we  have  even  come  to  feel 


x  INTRODUCTION 

that   it    is    undignified,  almost    unmanly,    to  play- 
nurse  maid  to  our  own  children  in  public. 

By  common  consent  we  place  the  defence  of  our 
country  and  the  call  of  her  needs  above  all  personal 
and  financial  interests,  no  matter  how  weighty 
and  grave.  We  ought  equally  to  recognize  our 
duty  to  the  race,  as  embodied  in  our  children,  as 
taking  precedence  over  anything  and  everything 
else.  Of  course  we  work  and  slave  largely  that  we 
may  be  able  to  give  certain  advantages  and  a  good 
start  to  our  children.  But  in  so  doing  we  may  be 
easily  robbing  them  of  things  far  more  valuable 
than  anything  that  can  be  bought  with  money. 
We  should  plan  our  engagements  so  as  to  devote 
a  part  of  every  day  and  a  day  or  more  out  of 
every  week  to  our  children  as  regularly  and  as 
religiously  as  we  do  to  our  business,  our  commit- 
tees, or  our  clubs.  If  this  should  involve  a  com- 
plete recasting  and  rearranging  of  our  hours  of 
work  and  days  of  work  in  the  week,  so  much  the 
better.  It  would  profit  business  and  the  business 
man,  work  and  the  worker,  almost  as  much  as  it 
would  the  child.  A  child  has  just  as  much  right  to 
and  need  of  his  father's  companionship  and  help 
and  influence  as  his  mother's. 


WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 


CHAPTER  I 

BEFORE    THE    LITTLE    ONE    COMES 

WHEN  the  new  life  has  begun  there  follows 
a  period  of  brooding  and  expectancy 
which  is  one  of  the  most  sacred  in  the  life 
of  woman.  Superstition  and  stupidity  have  done 
their  best  to  fill  this  time,  naturally  and  normally 
one  of  the  safest  and  happiest  in  nature,  with 
fears  and  forebodings,  but  nowhere  is  nature  more 
absolutely  to  be  trusted.  So  great  is  her  tenderness 
for  the  new  life  that  the  older  life  becomes  of  secon- 
dary importance.  Short  of  absolute  starvation, 
serious  infectious  disease,  or  severe  accident,  little 
or  nothing  that  happens  to  the  mother  will  have 
any  serious  effect  in  disturbing  the  growth  of  the 
child.  The  extent  to  which  nature  can  keep  the 
coming  life  in  a  watertight  compartment,  as  it  were, 
shut  off  from  the  rest  of  the  body  fluids  and  tissues, 
is  something  marvellous.  Even  in  such  an  extreme 
case  as  that  of  a  mother  in  an  advanced  stage  of 
consumption,  not  only  will  the  child  be  born  in 
surprisingly  good  condition,  but  the  progress  of  the 
dread  disease  in  the  mother  will  be  temporarily 
arrested  —  only  to  rush  on,  however,  with  cataract* 


4  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

like  headway  after  birth  has  occurred.  It  is  a 
commonplace  of  vital  statistics  that  expectant 
mothers  have  a  distinct  and  noticeably  lower  sus- 
ceptibility to  the  attack  of  infectious  diseases,  with 
the  single  exception  perhaps  of  small  pox,  than 
have  other  women  in  the  community  of  their  age 
and  class,  and  that  when  they  are  attacked  they 
resist  them  exceedingly  well,  unless  violent  enough 
to  cause  the  death  of  the  new  life. 

Of  course  with  the  double  strain  thrown  upon  hef 
blood-purifying  organs  comes  a  slightly  greater 
liability  to  disturbances  of  the  liver  and  kidneys, 
but  this  is  more  than  offset  by  the  lessened  sus- 
ceptibility to  infectious  diseases,  and  in  the  de- 
cided majority  of  instances  maternity  is  accom- 
panied by  improved  nutrition  and  a  lower  death 
and  disease  rate. 

Due  probably  to  this  overloading  of  the  blood 
with  waste  poisons  there  is  in  mothers  of  either 
excitable  or  depressed  nervous  temperaments  some 
tendency  to  an  exaggeration  of  these  mental  states, 
but  even  this  is  far  less  common  than  is  popularly 
supposed.  While  the  bearing  of  a  new  life  is  a  grave 
and  weighty  undertaking,  which  should  be  by  no 
means  entered  into  lightly  and  recklessly,  invol- 
ving serious,  and  often  distressing,  strains  upon 
patience  and  endurance,  much  suffering,  and  some 
risk  of  life,  so  that  every  woman  who  goes  through 
it  has  placed  the  race  under  a  lasting  debt  of  grat- 


BEFORE  THE  LITTLE  ONE  COMES         5 

itude  to  her,  yet  so  perfectly  has  nature  surrounded 
it  with  safeguards  that  the  chances  are  at  least 
twenty  to  one  in  favour  of  a  happy  issue  for  all 
parties  concerned,  and  the  actual  mortality  of 
married  women  during  the  childbearing  period  is 
no  higher  than  that  of  spinsters  of  the  same  age. 

The  only  thing  necessary  for  the  most  anxious  and 
conscientious  mother  to  do  is  to  lead  a  healthy, 
normal,  happy  life  with  as  little  departure  as 
possible  from  her  former  habits,  unless  these  were 
unwholesome  or  unsanitary.  At  no  time  is  it 
more  desirable  that  as  much  of  the  day  and  night 
should  be  spent  in  the  open  air  as  possible,  and 
instead  of  neglecting  her  exercise  she  should  be 
most  scrupulous  to  keep  all  her  muscular  activities 
at  a  high  level,  and  maintain  that  level  just  as  long 
as  circumstances  will  permit.  It  is  well,  of  course, 
to  avoid  exercises  or  sports  involving  severe  physical 
strains,  or  risk  of  falls  and  such  injuries,  but  it  is 
far  better  and  safer  to  err  on  the  side  of  too  much 
open  air  life  and  exercise  than  too  little,  for  it  will 
mean  a  happier  and  more  normal  ending,  and  a 
healthier  and  more  vigorous  child. 

Many  women  seriously  impair  their  health, 
and  add  to  the  discomforts  and  distresses  of  the 
situation,  by  shutting  themselves  up  too  much  in- 
doors and  taking  little  or  no  exercise.  Above  all, 
no  woman  should  be  for  a  moment  deterred  from 
going  about  with  absolute  freedom  and  without 


6  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

hesitancy  wherever  she  wishes,  and  wherever  the 
needs  of  her  health,  or  her  family  duties,  or  social 
affairs  require,  by  any  fear  of  possible  comment  or 
from  a  false  sense  of  modesty.  The  growth  of  a 
new  life  is  far  too  high  and  serious  and  important  a 
matter  to  society  and  to  the  race  to  be  interfered 
with  for  a  moment  by  ridiculous  and,  indeed,  im- 
moral and  indecent  conventions  and  trivialities 
of  this  sort.  Motherhood  has  undisputed  right  of 
way  over  anything  and  everything  else  in  this  world, 
and  every  true  man,  every  true  woman,  will  gladly 
recognize  that  right  wherever  exercised. 

As  for  the  popular  fears  that  the  child  may 
possibly  be  affected  or  "marked"  in  some  way 
by  anything  that  the  mother  may  see  at  this  period, 
or  any  unpleasant  impressions  which  are  made  upon 
her  mind,  these  are  nothing  but  the  purest  super- 
stitions and  fairy  tales,  which  belong  in  the  same 
mental  ash  barrel  with  the  Headless  Horseman  and 
the  Hundred  League  Boots.  Of  course  every  Wise 
Woman,  every  ancient  Mother  in  Israel,  can  tell 
you  of  a  dozen  instances  where  such  portentous 
calamities  have  happened,  but  to  every  one  who  has 
given  them  the  slightest  serious  investigation 
they  are  simply  a  laughing  stock.  All  the  so-called 
marks  and  imitative  deformities  are  now  known 
to  be  due  to  natural  causes,  arrests  of  develop- 
ment from  causes  working  in  the  child's  own  body, 
and  having  absolutely  no  connection  with  anything 


BEFORE  THE  LITTLE  ONE  COMES         7 

outside  of  it.  They  occur  just  as  frequently  in 
the  children  of  women  who  have  never  been  fright- 
ened or  shocked  or  "impressed"  as  in  those  who 
have;  and  now  that  we  are  able  to  tell  with  pre- 
cision from  our  knowledge  of  prenatal  development, 
the  month,  and  even,  in  many  cases,  the  week  in 
which  they  took  place,  in  every  case  investigated 
this  has  been  found  to  be  anywhere  from  three  to 
six  months  before  the  shock  or  the  fright  which  is 
alleged  to  have  caused  them.  In  fact  we  know  now 
that  ninety  per  cent,  of  all  these  changes  occur  be- 
fore the  end  of  the  third  month,  while  the  shocks 
and  frights  seldom  occur  before  the  fifth  to  the 
eighth. 

Nothing  that  a  woman  says  or  hears,  no  mental 
or  emotional  impression  that  she  receives,  can  affect 
the  unborn  child  in  any  appreciable  way — nothing, 
in  fact,  that  she  can  experience,  except  the  serious 
physical  injuries,  starvation,  infections  or  accidents 
which  we  have  already  mentioned.  Although  arrests 
of  development,  and  congenital  defects,  have  at- 
tracted an  immense  amount  of  attention  on  account 
of  their  strangeness,  and  of  the  eager  way  in  which 
rumour  and  fairy  tale  have  been  busy  with  them, 
yet  in  point  of  actual  frequency  they  are  among  the 
rarest  curiosities  of  medicine,  and  occur  only  once 
or  twice  in  a  thousand  births. 

With  the  double  demand  upon  her  powers  of  nu- 
trition the  appetitie  of  the  mother  usually  in- 


8  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

creases,  and  while  in  nine  cases  out  of  ten  this 
increase  is  along  perfectly  wholesome  and  health- 
ful lines,  occasionally  it  will  take  the  form  of  curious 
and  somewhat  unusual  cravings  for  particular 
articles  of  food.  There  is  very  seldom  any  dietetic 
harm  in  any  of  these  whims,  in  fact  in  many  in- 
stances they  tend  to  fill  a  gap  in  the  dietary,  or 
redress  an  imperfectly  balanced  ration,  and  unless 
they  call  for  something  positively  injurious  it  is 
usually  best  to  gratify  them.  But  imagination 
has  been  busy  again  with  these  trifling  and  rare 
eccentricities  and  magnified  them  into  factors  of 
most  baleful  influence  upon  the  future  of  the  child. 
This  was  perhaps  natural  enough  for  primitive  man, 
who  never  could  understand  the  mystery  of  birth 
and  consequently  surrounded  it  with  an  atmos- 
phere of  legend  and  myth,  much  of  which  survives 
at  the  present  day.  These  are,  however,  as  arrant 
fairy  tales  as  were  ever  crooned  over  camp  fires,  or 
are  told  with  bated  breath  by  children  round  the 
nursery  hearth,  before  the  lamps  are  lit,  to-day. 
No  maternal  cravings,  whether  gratified  or  ungrati- 
fied,  have  the  slightest  effect  upon  the  child. 

The  diet  of  the  mother  should  be  abundant, 
nutritious,  varied  and  well  cooked.  The  greatest, 
I  had  almost  said  the  only,  fault  which  it  can  have 
is  to  be  too  scanty.  There  is  neither  any  kind  of 
food  nor  class  of  food  which  has  any  injurious  effect 
upon  the  new  life,  or  is  there  any  other  which  is 


BEFORE  THE  LITTLE  ONE  COMES         9 

peculiarly  good  for  either  mother  or  child.  Any 
abundant  diet  which  will  keep  the  mother  in  good 
health  and  comfort  will  provide  well  for  the  new 
life. 

Only  one  factor  should  be  watched  with  special 
care,  but  that  only  slightly  greater  than  at  all  other 
times  in  life,  and  that  is  the  scrupulous  regularity 
and  fullest  activity  of  all  the  processes  by  which 
waste  is  eliminated  from  the  body.  This  will  be 
largely  insured  by  the  methods  already  considered 
—  an  abundant  and  well  varied  dietary,  and  plenty 
of  life  and  exercise  in  the  open  air.  But  it  is  well 
at  this  period  to  see  that  the  diet  is  even  richer  than 
usual  in  fresh  fruits  and  fresh  vegetables,  and  that 
an  abundance  of  liquids  —  milk,  water,  lemonade, 
etc.,  —  is  taken,  and  to  promote  the  activity  of  the 
skin  by  means  of  exercise  to  the  point  of  perspiration 
and  by  hot  baths.  The  impression  occasionally 
met  with  that  any  particular  form  of  diet,  for  in- 
stance, an  avoidance  of  meat,  or  a  large  amount  of 
fruit  acids,  assures  an  easier  culmination  of 
the  process,  is  a  pure  delusion. 


CHAPTER  II 

BABIES    AS    BULBS 

WHAT  is  a  baby  for  if  not  to  be  played 
with?  Everybody  loves  a  baby,  but  he 
certainly  needs  to  be  protected  from  his 
friends  at  times.  We  have  been  studying  the  child 
most  industriously  and  enthusiastically  for  a  decade 
or  two,  and  have  discovered  that,  assiduous  and 
sleepless  as  the  care  is  that  he  requires  at  times, 
at  certain  stages  and  at  frequent  intervals  what  he 
most  needs  is  wholesome  neglect.  Give  him  a 
little  chance  to  live  his  own  life;  to  fulfil  his  destiny. 
Our  earliest  attitude  toward  babies  is  and  always 
has  been  a  singularly  mixed  one,  alternating  be- 
tween states  of  delighted  astonishment  and  absolute 
panic.  At  one  moment  we  treat  them  as  if  they 
were  the  most  amusing  playthings,  the  most  in- 
genious dollies  in  the  world.  We  joggle  them, 
tickle  them,  and  booh  at  them,  and  interpret  their 
signs  of  astonishment  as  marks  of  enjoyment. 
We  show  off  all  their  little  tricks  to  every  admiring 
visitor.  We  do  everything  short  of  taking  them  to 
pieces  to  "see  how  the  wheels  go  wound."  At 
other  times  we  are  firmly  convinced  that  unless  we 


BABIES  AS  BULBS  n 

are  strictly  "on  the  job"  day  and  night  they  will 
stop  growing.  Unless  we  keep  them  properly 
dressed,  bandaged  and  packed,  they  will  grow 
crooked  or  lop-sided. 

I  have  sometimes  thought,  as  I  have  watched 
the  unrolling  from  its  clothes-cocoon  of  a  very  new 
baby,  and  marvelled  at  the  layer  after  layer  of 
flannel  which  had  to  be  peeled  off  before  you  could 
get  down  to  the  baby  at  all,  that  the  beliefs  of  the 
old-fashioned  mother  about  the  ability  of  a  baby 
to  hold  its  limbs  together  and  grow  them  straight 
without  assistance  must  be  much  the  same  as  the 
view  of  the  small  boy  upon  the  function  of  a  cat's 
tail:  "Cats  have  long  curly  tails  which  they  wrap 
around  their  feet  when  they  sit  down.  I  no  a  cat 
that  had  no  tale  and  it  was  afraid  to  sit  down  in 
public  for  fear  its  feet  would  skatter."  I  really  do 
not  know  how  else  the  swaddling  bands  and  ridic- 
ulous trailing  skirts  of  the  past  generation  of  babies 
could  otherwise  be  accounted  for. 

These  things,  however,  have  largely  now  passed 
into  history  with  the  head-board  of  the  papoose  to 
flatten  his  forehead,  and  the  back-board  of  his  basket 
to  keep  his  spine  straight.  But  we  are  still  almost 
as  worried  and  as  interferingly  officious  about  his 
mind  and  his  faculties  as  we  were  formerly  about 
his  body  and  limbs.  We  insist  upon  startling  him 
or  waving  objects  before  his  eyes  to  see  if  he  will 
"take  notice."  We  apply  a  variety  of  approved 


12  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

tests  to  see  if  he  has  right  sense.  We  anxiously  en- 
deavour to  get  him  to " recognize "  us;  and  are  greatly 
distressed  if  we  cannot  get  him  to  grin  in  response 
to  our  gurgles,  clicks  and  pokings  in  the  ribs.  All 
these  are  not  only  of  no  benefit  to  the  unfortunate 
scrap  of  humanity,  but  a  distinct  distraction  from 
the  important  and  absorbing  business  which  occu- 
pies him  completely  —  that  of  growing  up.  He 
would  much  prefer  to  devote  himself  exclusively 
to  this  if  we  would  only  let  him;  but  we  generally 
won't  unless  he  is  goaded  to  manifest  his  disapproval 
by  unmistakable  squalls. 

A  masterly  inactivity  is  the  hardest  of  all  policies 
to  pursue.  It  is  far  easier  to  do  something  right 
away  quick,  and  to  repeat  the  performance  every 
ten  minutes.  It  is  really  hard  to  believe  that 
that  tiny  bundle  of  human  possibilities  which  we 
call  a  baby  will  ever  succeed  in  growing  into  a  man 
unless  we  exert  ourselves  to  the  utmost  during  the 
entire  process.  Active  and  strenuous  assistance  from 
us  is  the  only  thing  that  can  save  him.  Yet  few 
impressions  can  be  farther  from  the  fact.  Nature 
requires  us  to  provide  the  raw  materials  of  the  proc- 
ess, in  the  shape  of  food,  warmth,  and  as  little 
clothing  as  possible;  but  she  and  the  baby  will  do 
all  the  working  of  it  into  the  finished  product  with 
very  little  assistance  from  us.  Indeed,  what  she 
would  be  most  grateful  for  is  a  free  hand  and  no 
"butting  in"  at  the  wrong  time. 


BABIES  AS  BULBS  13 

The  first  lesson  in  regard  to  his  food  supply  is 
significant  and  should  be  taken  to  heart.  As  it  is 
now  well  known,  he  comes  into  the  world  "loaded," 
and  needs  no  supply  from  external  sources  for  the 
first  three  days.  Indeed,  he  is  much  better  off  with- 
out it.  He  has  all  he  can  do  to  sleep  and  learn  to 
breathe  and  get  accustomed  to  that  new  and  trouble- 
some influence,  light.  If  we  have  the  self-control 
to  refrain  from  forcing  anything  into  his  unwilling 
mouth,  excepting  an  occasional  teaspoonful  of 
water,  we  have  lost  our  best  chance  of  starting  him 
off  as  a  colicky  baby.  For  the  next  two  or  three 
weeks  we  ought  not  to  expect  any  more  signs  of 
intelligence  or  active  interest  in  anything  than  from 
a  healthy  onion.  And  he  won't  make  much  more 
noise  than  the  latter  if  he  is  properly  handled. 

The  idea  that  babies  squall  by  nature  as  a  matter 
of  habit  or  out  of  pure  "cussedness"  is  both  a  delu- 
sion and  a  base  slander  on  the  baby.  Not  even  a 
pig  will  squeal  when  he  gets  enough  to  eat  and  at 
sufficiently  frequent  intervals.  And  a  farmer  who 
should  hear  his  cherished  hogs  squealing  in  their 
fattening  pens  would  promptly  "call  down"  the 
hired  man  whose  duty  it  was  to  feed  them.  When- 
ever a  baby  squalls,  it  is  some  grown-up's  fault. 
He  does  not  want  very  much  at  a  time,  but  he  does 
like  it  regularly.  And  when  you  have  once,  by  a 
little  careful  observation,  "struck  his  gait"  as  to 
amount  and  frequency  —  about  two  ounces  every 


i4  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

two  hours  is  a  fair  average  to  begin  with  —  then  his 
little  life  will  be  one  peaceful  sequence  of  eating  and 
sleeping,  sleeping  and  eating,  but  all  the  time 
growing  with  as  little  fuss  or  disturbance  as  a  tulip 
makes  when  it  is  pushing  up  its  green  pencil 
through  the  brown  earth. 

Joggling  and  rocking  and  jiggling  up  and  down 
as  provocatives  of  slumber  are  not  only  unnecessary 
but  absurd.  No  healthy  child  needs  to  be  quieted 
or  put  to  sleep.  If  he  isn't  either  quiet  or  asleep, 
there  is  something  wrong  with  him.  Most  pro- 
cedures that  we  inflict  upon  unfortunate  infants 
to  put  them  to  sleep  would  have  anything  but  a 
soothing  effect  if  applied  to  us.  When  a  baby  does 
go  to  sleep  under  some  of  them,  it  must  be  in  self- 
defence  in  order  to  get  them  to  stop.  Certainly 
this  would  apply  to  many  of  the  lullabies  that  are 
inflicted  upon  the  helpless  morsels.  How  would 
we  like  to  be  joggled  for  three  quarters  of  an 
hour  steadily  just  after  a  heavy  dinner?  When 
the  joggling  has  produced  its  natural  Atlantic 
Liner  effect,  this  of  course  leaves  a  vacancy  to  be 
filled,  then  more  joggling  until  another  Jonah  per- 
formance occurs,  and  so  on  literally  ad  nauseam. 

Remember  that  the  normal  state  of  a  healthy 
baby  for  the  first  three  months  is  not  wakefulness, 
but  sleep.  The  only  thing  that  he  thinks  it  worth 
while  to  wake  up  for  is  the  absorption  of  nutriment; 
and  when  he  has  once  successfully  surrounded  this, 


BABIES  AS  BULBS  15 

he  is  not  going  to  waste  any  time  in  staying  awake. 
If,  however,  he  does  want  to  stay  awake  for  a  little 
while  out  of  pure  good  nature  and  good  fellowship, 
by  all  means  let  him.  He  will  go  to  sleep  in  the 
end  just  as  inevitably  as  water  will  run  down  hill. 
There  is  no  more  need  for  your  taking  the  personal 
responsibility  of  putting  him  to  sleep  than  there  is 
of  seeing  that  darkness  follows  sunset.  On  the 
other  hand,  when  he  is  once  asleep,  he  should  never 
be  awakened  for  anything  short  of  the  house  being 
on  fire. 

It  is  most  important  to  get  him  into  regular  hab- 
its, but  it  should  be  his  kind  of  regularity  and  not 
yours.  He  is  no  railroad  train  that  reaches  an  eat- 
ing station  on  schedule  time,  just  every  two  hours. 
They  did  not  know  anything  about  clocks  where 
he  came  from.  But  he  has  a  natural  self-acting 
dinner  gong  in  his  little  interior  which  serves  his 
purposes  excellently  and  will  rise  to  the  potency 
of  a  fog  horn  or  a  fire  alarm  if  you  do  not  pay  atten- 
tion to  it  promptly.  His  idea  of  regularity  is  a 
nicely  balanced  rhythm  of  sleeping  till  he  is  hungry 
and  then  feeding  till  he  is  sleepy,  with  a  fine  dis- 
regard for  the  hands  of  the  clock  and  even  for  the 
difference  between  day  and  night.  As  his  fuel  box 
is  limited  in  size  and  the  degree  of  concentration 
of  the  fuel  administered  does  not  vary  much,  it 
will  take  him  just  about  so  long  to  burn  up  each 
charge,  so  that  he  will  tap  the  gong  at  pretty  reg- 


16  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

ular  intervals.  But  there  will  be  nothing  machine- 
like  about  this  regularity.  If  he  should  awake 
fifteen  minutes  before  the  sacred  hour,  and  show  by 
unmistakable  minor  signs  that  he  is  ready  for  busi- 
ness, feed  him  at  once.  He  should  never  be  allowed 
to  go  to  the  length  of  crying.  To  cry  is  a  signal 
of  distress,  and  a  baby  that  cries  much  has  been 
unlucky  in  its  parents  or  its  nurse. 

The  idea  that  babies  cry  to  expand  their  lungs 
or  to  develop  their  voices  is  a  nurse's  yarn.  A 
child  that  never  cries  is  as  healthy  and  as  happy 
as  a  nation  that  has  no  history.  If  he  happens  to 
sleep  on  past  the  precise  hour,  do  not  wake  him  on 
any  account.  So  long  as  he  sleeps  it  is  a  sign  that 
he  has  got  plenty  of  fuel  under  his  boiler  and  water 
in  it,  and  is  growing  like  a  weed.  All  the  growth 
processes  and  the  construction  activities  of  the 
body  are  most  active  in  sleep.  It  is  the  spending 
and  the  down-breaking  processes  that  are  dominant 
when  we  are  awake.  We  take  in  food  while  we  are 
awake,  but  we  utilize  it  chiefly  while  we  are  asleep. 
Do  not  be  afraid  to  give  your  little  human  dormouse 
plenty  of  leeway  in  regard  to  his  hours  of  waking. 

Some  people  seem  to  have  the  mechanical,  sal- 
vation-depends-upon-it  kind  of  idea  of  regularity 
of  the  old  lady  who  was  travelling  down  the  Hudson 
Valley.  No  sooner  had  she  boarded  the  train  than 
she  began  to  show  great  uneasiness  for  fear  she 
would  not  know  when  she  got  to  Poughkeepsie. 


BABIES  AS  BULBS  17 

She  made  both  the  conductor  and  the  brakeman 
promise  that  they  would  be  sure  to  tell  her  when 
she  arrived  there;  and  when  the  time  approached, 
kept  asking  at  every  other  station  if  this  were  not 
Poughkeepsie.  The  conductor  promised  her  sol- 
emnly that  he  would  not  let  her  be  carried  past. 
But  just  before  they  got  to  Poughkeepsie  they  had 
to  lay  off  for  another  train,  and  then  hurry  past  to 
the  next  junction  to  catch  up  with  the  schedule, 
with  several  other  complications  added.  So  that 
in  the  hurry  and  bustle  of  the  moment  he  was  nearly 
a  quarter  of  a  mile  past  Poughkeepsie  before  he 
thought  of  the  old  lady.  So  mortified  was  he  at 
the  idea  of  failing  in  his  promise  that  he  actually 
pulled  the  rope  and  ordered  the  train  backed  up 
again  into  the  station.  Then  he  hurried  down  the 
aisle  and  in  his  politest  manner  said:  "Here  we 
are,  madam.  This  is  Poughkeepsie.  Can  I  help 
you  off  with  your  valise?"  "Oh,  no!  Thank 
you  ever  so  much.  I  am  not  going  to  get  off  at 
Poughkeepsie.  I  am  not  going  to  get  off  at  all; 
but  the  doctor  told  me  I  was  to  take  a  pill  when  I 
got  to  Poughkeepsie." 

This  kind  of  punctuality  is  not  necessary  with 
the  baby.  But  if  he  is  allowed  to  follow  his  own 
sweet  will  and  drink  himself  to  sleep  and  sleep 
himself  awake  on  his  own  schedule,  he  will  be  so 
regular  you  will  hardly  know  he  is  on  earth.  In- 
deed, I  have  actually  known  of  a  family  who  lived 


i8  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

next  door  to  a  house  where  a  baby  was  being  brought 
up  on  this  vegetable  plan,  who  indignantly  refused 
to  believe  that  there  was  a  baby  in  that  house  at 
all,  as  they  had  never  heard  even  a  whimper  in  the 
daytime,  or  seen  lights  in  the  windows  or  signs  of 
sentry  duty  in  the  dead  of  night. 

Another  thing  we  must  learn  to  appreciate  and 
respect  in  the  baby  is  his  attitude  toward  light. 
This  is  widely  different  from  ours.  Light  is  one 
of  the  most  stimulating  and  attractive  things  in 
the  world  to  us,  and  the  brighter  the  better.  Wit- 
ness the  glitter  of  the  Gin  Palace  and  the  blaze  of 
Coney  Island.  But  to  a  poor  blinking  tot  of  a 
baby  it  is  as  dazzling  and  irritating  as  it  is  grateful 
to  us.  His  chief  objection  to  the  new  world  in 
which  he  finds  himself,  if  he  could  put  it  in  words, 
would  be:  "It's  so  beastly  light."  He  is  born 
a  cave-man  in  more  senses  than  one.  While  the 
rooms  which  he  occupies  should  get  plenty  of  sun- 
shine, this  should  never  be  allowed  to  fall  directly 
into  his  eyes  or  full  upon  his  face.  He  has  neither 
pigment  in  his  tender  skin  nor  hair  on  the  top  of  his 
pink  little  head  to  protect  him  against  the  light 
rays;  and  it  is  little  short  of  "cruelty  to  animals" 
to  lay  an  unfortunate  baby  on  his  back  in  a  trough- 
like  perambulator  or  baby  buggy  so  deep  and  so 
well  padded  that  he  cannot  even  squirm,  load  him 
down  with  clothing  and  wraps,  or  even  actually 
strap  him  down,  so  that  he  can  lift  neither  hand  nor 


BABIES  AS  BULBS  19 

foot,  and  then  wheel  him  about  for  hours  with  his 
little  face  turned  up  to  the  full  glare  of  the  light 
and  even  the  direct  rays  of  the  sun.  Here  is  where 
the  foundation  of  many  a  case  of  headache,  of 
irritable  nerves,  of  fretfulness  with  its  accompany- 
ing indigestion  and  sleeplessness  is  laid.  Look 
at  the  faces  of  these  poor  little  human  cocoons  and 
you  will  see,  three  times  out  of  five,  that  while 
they  are  bravely  trying  to  make  the  best  of  it  and 
accept  it  good  humouredly,  their  tiny  counte- 
nances are  wrinkled  into  one  universal  frown  of 
perplexity  and  protest. 

By  all  means  get  the  baby  into  the  open  air,  day 
and  night;  but  see  to  it  that  his  eyes  are  protected 
from  the  direct  glare  of  the  light,  either  by  hood  or 
sunshade,  or  by  turning  his  back  to  it. 

It  is  also  important  to  bear  in  mind  this  attitude 
toward  light  in  another  field,  and  that  is  the  attract- 
ing of  the  child's  attention.  While  a  baby,  after 
the  first  few  weeks,  when  awake  will  follow  with  his 
eyes  any  bright  or  rapidly  moving  object  and  a 
little  later  clutch  at  it  with  his  hands  as  instinc- 
tively as  a  troutlet  will  snap  at  a  fly,  yet  a  very  few 
repetitions  of  this  movement  are  sufficient  to  tire 
him.  A  multiplicity  of  high  lights  in  the  picture 
presented  to  him  or  rapid  movements  before  his 
face  quickly  dazzle  and  confuse  him  and  get  on  his 
little  nerves.  He  must  be  regarded  as  much  in 
the  position  of  a  man  who  has  been  imprisoned  in 


20  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

a  half  underground  dungeon  for  weeks  and  then 
suddenly  brought  out  into  the  full  glare  of  the  sun- 
light. He  literally  sees  men  as  trees  walking.  The 
whole  of  his  surroundings  are  one  dazzling,  shifting 
kaleidoscope  of  colours  and  lights,  and  it  is  only 
by  the  slowest  and  most  gradual  degrees  that  he 
picks  out  here  a  feature  and  there  a  detail  until 
it  becomes  an  intelligible  whole  to  him.  He  gets 
three  times  as  many  flashes  and  shocks  and  stimuli 
from  his  environment  at  the  best  and  quietest  as 
he  is  able  to  make  any  use  of.  And  to  add  to  this 
confusion  by  dangling  things  in  front  of  his  eyes 
or  inane  snappings  of  fingers  or  chuckling  of  "pretty, 
pretty,"  in  order  to  make  him  sit  up  and  take  notice 
is  simply  a  worse  confounding  of  confusion. 

Let  the  baby  alone  until  he  is  ready  to  take  the 
initiative  in  wanting  to  play  with  you,  which  he 
surely  will  in  his  own  good  time.  If  adoring  rela- 
tives or  conscientiously  polite  visitors  wish  to  admire 
the  baby,  they  must  learn  to  do  so  while  he  is 
asleep.  It  will  be  far  better  and  easier  for  all 
parties  concerned.  The  all  too  prevalent  habit 
of  trying  to  get  the  baby  to  recognize  somebody 
whom  he  does  not  and  cannot  know  from  the  pro- 
verbial hole  in  the  ground  —  since  he  is  unable  as 
yet  even  to  conceive  of  his  existence  —  or  to  respond 
in  some  way  to  a  particular  gurgle  or  tickle  under 
the  chin  is  about  as  irrational  as  our  childish  habit 
of  digging  up  seeds  every  two  or  three  days  after 


BABIES  AS  BULBS  21 

we  had  planted  them,  to  see  if  they  were  grow- 
ing. You  need  not  be  a  bit  afraid  but  that  his 
brain  will  develop  all  right  even  though  he  takes 
no  more  notice  of  you  or  his  surroundings  than  a 
potato  sprout.  As  your  child  he  is  perfectly  safe 
to  show  at  least  some  signs  of  intelligence  sooner  or 
later  if  you  will  only  give  him  time. 

This  is  not  by  any  means  to  hold  that  babies 
should  not  be  dandled  and  petted  and  played  with. 
The  instinct  to  do  this  is  one  of  the  dearest  of  the 
mother-heart,  and  like  all  instincts  has  a  sound 
rational  basis.  When  the  child  is  ready  to  be 
chirped  at  and  tickled  and  jumped  up  and  down, 
when  he  himself  invites  you  to  a  game  of  play,  then 
play  and  petting  are  meat  and  drink  to  him,  and 
what  he  needs  above  everything  else.  No  child 
can  grow  up  healthy,  natural  and  human  without 
lots  of  love  and  affection  and  admiring  regard. 
What  babies  in  foundlings'  homes  and  hospitals  feel 
most  of  all  is  the  lack  of  petting  and  mothering. 
Only  those  who  are  bright  and  winning  enough  to 
attract  attention  and  to  awaken  affection  in  their 
attendants  are  able  to  avoid  growing  up  listless 
and  colourless  and  dreary.  You  cannot  possibly 
be  too  proud  or  too  fond  of  your  baby.  But  for 
heaven's  sake  do  not  kill  him  with  kindness.  And 
try  to  get  his  point  of  view.  The  important  thing 
is  to  make  him  happy  and  healthy,  not  to  amuse 
yourself,  or  gratify  your  pride  of  possession  and  dis- 


22  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

play.  When  he  wants  to  be  quiet,  let  him  be  quiet, 
and  when  he  wants  to  romp  and  play,  play  with 
him.  It  will  save  nerve  fag  for  both  of  you.  To 
know  when  to  let  well  enough  alone  is  half  the  secret 
of  success  and  happiness. 

Of  course  the  baby's  bed  should  be  large  and 
firm  enough  for  a  playground.  To  bury  a  helpless 
infant  in  a  boggy  trough  of  a  cot,  or  basket,  or  baby- 
buggy,  where  he  has  hardly  room  even  to  squirm, 
and  can  only  lie  stiffly  on  his  back  with  his  nose  and 
his  toes  toward  the  ceiling,  like  a  mummy  or  a 
stone  crusader  on  a  tomb,  is  little  short  of  cruelty. 
His  cot  should  have  a  mattress,  not  a  pulpy 
feather  bed,  soft  but  firm  enough  to  stay  flat, 
and  wide  enough  to  allow  him  to  roll  about  half  a 
yard  in  every  direction.  He  should  be  frequently 
laid  down  on  his  side,  and  as  soon  as  he  is  able 
allowed  to  kick  himself  over  on  to  either  side,  or 
even  on  his  face,  to  sleep. 

His  clothing  should  be  loose  enough  and  suffi- 
ciently "divided"  —  skirts  and  petticoats  are  an 
abomination  everywhere  and  most  of  all  on  a  baby  — 
to  permit  him  to  kick  every  limb  he's  got  to  any 
point  of  the  compass  —  and  to  all  four  at  once  if 
he  wishes  —  to  shake  hands  with  his  feet,  or  bring 
his  toes  up  in  front  of  his  face  for  investigation. 

If  he  can't  change  his  position  quick  enough  to 
suit  him,  help  him,  and  let  him  sit  up  whenever  he 
shows  an  ambition  in  that  direction.  Rub  and 


BABIES  AS  BULBS  23 

pat  his  little  back  occasionally  —  so  long  as  he 
audibly  expresses  his  approval  it's  all  right,  but 
don't  throw  him  over  your  shoulder  like  a  sack  of 
flour,  or  hang  him  face  downward  across  your  knee 
and  beat  a  drum-call  on  his  back,  "to  get  the  wind 
off  his  stomach.' 

If  he  has  been  properly  fed  and  handled  there'll 
be  no  wind  there.  If  he  hasn't,  it's  little  use  to 
half-joggle,  half-hypnotize  him  into  unconsciousness 
by  making  him  dizzy  and  drowsy. 


CHAPTER  III 

THE     NURSERY    AGE 

THE  natural  state  and  tendency  of  matter 
is  not  rest,  but  movement  in  a  right  line. 
If  it  be  stationary  it  is  only  so  held  by  the 
pull  of  opposing  force.  If  this  be  true  of  what  we 
term  "dead"  matter,  how  much  more  so  must  it 
be  of  living.  That  little  pink  bunch  of  folded  human 
rose  leaves  which  we  call  a  baby,  soft  and  tiny  and 
feeble  as  it  seems,  is  in  reality  charged  to  bursting 
with  elemental  force,  and  is  determined  to  grow 
as  surely  and  as  irresistibly  as  the  planet  whirls  in 
its  orbit.  All  we  have  to  do  is  to  provide  the  sim- 
ple necessary  surroundings  and  nature  will  do  the 
rest.  Even  babies  do  not  die  of  themselves,  but 
from  definite  cause,  preventable  nine  times  out  of 
ten.  If  the  triumphant  swing  of  their  tiny  life 
impulse  be  brought  to  a  standstill  this  is  not  by 
failure  from  within  but  by  interference  or  by 
resistance  from  without,  which  it  is  our  business 
and  usually  within  our  power  to  prevent.  Some 
of  this  prevention  must  begin,  in  Oliver  Wendell 
Holmes's  witty  phrase,  "with  the  grandparents," 
or  at  least  with  the  parents. 

24 


THE  NURSERY  AGE  25 

We  hear  much  of  the  inalienable  rights  of  man, 
but  too  little  of  the  rights  of  the  child.  Chief  and 
most  fundamental  of  all  is  the  right  to  be  well 
born.  From  a  biological  point  of  view  one  of  the 
greatest  if  not  the  greatest  of  all  crimes  is  to  bring 
into  the  world,  or  permit  to  be  brought  into  the 
world,  a  child  underfed,  diseased,  defective,  handi- 
capped in  any  way  for  life.  No  act  which  prevents 
this  will  stand  as  a  crime  ultimately  in  the  con- 
science of  the  race,  no  matter  what  church  or  state 
may  say  with  their  purblind  intelligence  and  anti- 
quated morals.  We  hear  much  from  pulpit  and 
bench  alike  of  the  sin  of  failing  to  produce  our  kind, 
but  too  little  of  its  alternative,  the  sin  of  bringing 
into  the  world  children  who  are  physically,  mentally, 
or  morally  crippled  from  birth,  an  offence  not  less 
against  the  child  than  the  community  and  which 
must  be  shouldered  as  a  counterbalance  by  the 
upholders  of  "until  death  do  us  part,"  or  the  denoun- 
cers of  attempts  to  control  fertility.  Two  thirds 
our  failures  in  every  class  of  life,  of  our  paupers 
and  our  criminals,  are  the  offspring  of  parents  who 
ought  never  to  have  been  permitted  to  marry  at 
all,  or  divorced  as  soon  as  one  found  the  other  out! 

Fortunately  the  birthright  of  good  breeding,  the 
proud  privilege  of  being  well  born,  is,  like  most 
things  worth  having,  fairly  common.  Even  with 
the  lamentable  carelessness,  not  to  say  recklessness, 
displayed  by  children  in  choosing  their  parents,  nine 


26  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

tenths,  yes,  ninety-five  per  cent.,  of  them  are  born 
with  all  the  possibilities  of  full  manhood  and  true 
womanhood,  of  the  greatest  things  and  highest  ac- 
complishments ever  yet  invented  wrapped  up  in  the 
heart  of  their  little  body  buds.  There  is  scarcely 
a  limit  to  the  shipwreck  which  our  own  folly  of  per- 
versity may  work  upon  our  own  bodies,  but  when 
it  comes  to  passing  on  these  masterpieces  of  dis- 
aster to  our  children,  Nature  puts  her  foot  down 
like  a  thousand-ton  granite  bowlder.  Our  bodies, 
with  what  we  are  pleased  to  term  our  minds, 
are  simply  appendages,  creatures  of  a  little  island  of 
brood-stuff  embedded  in  the  midst  of  them,  which, 
though  the  myriads  of  successive  bodies  which 
sheltered  it  have  died  and  returned  to  dust,  has 
itself  been  alive  and  triumphant,  untouched  by 
decay,  undimmed  by  time,  since  the  dawn  of  the 
world.  We  inherit  an  entailed  estate  which  we 
pass  on  to  our  children  as  we  have  received  it  from 
our  fathers.  We  have  only  the  spending  of  the 
interest,  and  only  by  most  fiendish  ingenuity  can 
impair  the  principal.  The  torch  of  life  which  we 
hand  on  is  the  same  which  has  been  passed  down  to 
us  from  hand  to  hand  through  all  the  ages.  Its 
light  it  is  which  flickers  in  the  eye  and  glows  in 
the  cheek  of  the  baby  in  its  cradle.  Nature  has 
been  planning  for  ten  million  years  to  make  your 
baby  a  success;  nobody  can  prevent  her  except 
yourself 


THE  NURSERY  AGE  27 

The  best  policy  in  baby  raising  is  one  of  a  sleep- 
less and  masterly  inactivity.  The  first,  last  and 
always  most  important  thing  to  be  done  is  to 
watch  the  baby,  the  second  is  to  watch  the  baby, 
and  the  third  is  to  WATCH  THE  BABY.  Remember, 
instead  of  being  younger,  he  is  twenty  to  thirty 
years  older  than  you  are,  for  you  have  both  been 
alive  since  the  dawn  of  time  and  the  wisdom  of 
Nature  was  not  exhausted  when  you  were  born. 

When  it  first  appears  in  the  light  of  day,  the  tip 
of  the  sprout  of  our  tiny  human  plantlet,  euphe- 
mistically termed  its  face,  is  neither  affable  in  its 
expression  nor  (if  I  am  assured  of  police  protection) 
attractive.  In  fact,  if  he  were  twenty  years  older  we 
should  say  he  had  "a  grouch"  and  wanted  nothing 
so  much  as  to  be  let  alone.  His  evident  and  absorb- 
ing desire  is  to  shut  his  eyes,  open  his  mouth  and 
take  what  Nature  sends  him,  and  then  go  to  sleep 
again  till  next  time.  For  heaven's  sake  let  him! 
If  a  baby's  eyes  come  open  oftener  than  his  mouth 
does  in  the  first  week  of  his  existence,  it  is  a  bad 
sign.  He  is  geared  to  sleep  twenty-three  hours  out 
of  the  twenty-four  and  to  grow  every  minute  that 
he  sleeps.  Why  should  he  waste  any  time  staying 
awake,  even  to  have  you  decide  the  absorbing 
question  as  to  just  what  colour  his  eyes  are,  or  how 
many  fingers  and  toes  he  has,  or  whether  he  looks 
most  like  his  father  or  his  mother;  especially  as 
the  eyes  of  all  new  babies  are,  like  those  of  puppies 


28  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

and  kittens,  exactly  the  same  colour  —  that  of 
a  slate  pencil.  By  a  perpetual  miracle  which 
never  loses  its  wondrousness,  they  have  exactly 
ten  fingers  and  a  like  number  of  toes,  whether  they 
are  ever  counted  or  not.  And  —  if  their  mothers 
are  safely  out  of  hearing  —  they  all  look  exactly 
alike;  and  their  adorable  little  crumple  of  features 
resembles  no  other  living  human  being  except  them- 
selves, or  any  other  baby  born  the  same  day.  They 
may  be  just  as  eager  for  the  centre  of  the  limelight 
as  anybody  in  forty  years'  time,  but  all  they  want 
now  is  shade  and  moisture  and  warmth,  and  lots 
of  them. 

For  the  first  three  weeks  of  his  existence  he  does 
not  know  that  he  has  anything  but  a  mouth,  and 
nobody  else  should  either.  All  openings  of  that 
rosy  portal  should  be  exclusively  for  that  which 
entereth  into,  not  that  which  proceedeth  forth 
from,  it.  A  healthy  baby  his  first  half  month  should 
scarcely  make  much  more  noise  than  a  potato  and 
should  be  treated  like  one,  planted  in  a  warm  sunny 
spot,  watered  well,  and  disturbed  as  little  as  possible. 
When  he  wants  anything  he  will  wake  up  and  men- 
tion it,  but  only  just  loud  enough  for  you  to  notice 
it,  unless  you  are  inattentive  enough  to  require 
him  to  repeat  his  remark.  Then  you  will  think 
that  you  have  got  in  the  track  of  an  ambulance; 
but  this  will  seldom  happen  if  you  are  politely 
attentive  to  his  first  suggestion.  A  baby  never 


THE  NURSERY  AGE  29 

cries  just  to  expand  his  lungs,  or  to  hear  himself 
talk.  These  little  weaknesses  are  of  much  later 
growth  in  the  age  of  oratory  and  voice  culture. 

The  first  danger  signal  in  the  nursery  is  wake- 
fulness,  especially  if  combined  with  restlessness; 
and  the  second  is  noise.  It  is  as  bad  a  sign  for  a 
baby  under  a  month  old  to  be  awake  much  of  the 
daytime  as  it  is  for  a  grown-up  to  be  awake  much  of 
the  night.  We  hardly  realize  how  closely  and 
inseparably  connected  sleep  and  growth  are.  We 
work  while  we  are  awake,  but  we  grow  while  we 
are  asleep.  We  earn  our  money  in  the  daytime,  but 
spend  it  at  night  in  infancy  —  as  sometimes  in 
adult  life.  When  we  are  doubling  our  weight  every 
eight  months  in  babyhood  we  sleep  eighteen  to 
twenty  hours  a  day.  As  long  as  we  can  sleep  ten 
or  more  hours  a  day  we  continue  to  grow.  When 
we  reach  the  dead  line  of  nine  hours  our  growth 
stops;  and  when  we  fall  to  eight,  seven  or  six,  each 
hour  marks  a  step  on  our  descent  into  the  valley 
of  the  shadow.  A  baby  is  the  visible  embodiment 
of  "rosy  sleep,"  and  anything  that  murders  sleep 
is  death  to  him.  But  don't  imagine  that  because 
he  sleeps  so  much  he  does  not  need  much  to  eat. 
He  sleeps  so  that  he  can  devote  his  undisturbed 
attention  to  the  business  of  growth,  and  such  a 
success  does  he  make  of  his  business  that  he  grows 
five  times  as  fast  as  he  ever  will  again,  and  requires 
three  times  as  much  food  in  porportion  to  his  body 


30  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

weight  as  you  do,  or  nearly  one  fourth  as  much  as 
a  full  grown  man.  Almost  the  only  thing  that  will 
make  him  wakeful  or  noisy  is  hunger,  either  because 
he  does  not  get  enough  food,  or  because  what  he 
gets  is  not  digestible. 

This  huge  food  intake  and  body  building  that  he 
is  doing  with  it  mean  two  other  things  which  it  is 
most  important  to  remember  —  that  like  an  engine 
at  full  speed  he  is  giving  off  a  huge  amount  of  heat 
and  requires  an  abundant  supply  of  air  for  draught 
purposes.  Why  should  we  be  so  anxious  to  keep 
the  baby  warm  and  so  fearful  that  he  will  get  chilled 
when  he  is  manufacturing  nearly  twice  as  much 
heat  in  proportion  to  his  weight  as  we  are?  The 
explanation  is  simple:  He  has  so  much  more 
surface  in  proportion  to  his  bulk,  he  is  literally  like 
Miles  Standish — 

A  little  chimney 
Heated  hot  in  a  minute 

and  as  quickly  cooled.  The  way  to  keep  a  baby 
warm,  then,  is  not  to  overheat  the  room,  but  to 
keep  his  body  well  covered.  Only  do  that  and  you 
will  find  him  a  perfect  little  furnace.  But,  like 
any  other  furnace,  if  he  is  going  to  keep  up  a  hot 
fire  he  must  have  an  open  draught,  so  whatever 
you  do  don't  cover  his  face  or  you  will  "chill" 
him,  precisely  as  you  would  a  stove  by  shutting 
the  draught  and  turning  down  the  damper. 


THE  NURSERY  AGE  31 

There  is  absolutely  no  danger  of  a  baby's  "catch- 
ing cold"  by  the  exposure  of  its  face  or  through  its 
nose  unless  the  air  that  it  has  to  breath  contains 
germs,  or  gases,  or  dust.  Babies  are  exceedingly 
sensitive  to  foul  or  overheated  air,  not  in  the  least 
so  to  cool,  fresh  air.  Keep  the  nursery  windows 
open  toward  Jerusalem  or  any  other  place,  day  and 
night,  and  if  by  so  doing  you  make  the  room  too 
cool  to  be  comfortable  for  the  old  nurse  and  the 
neighbourhood  busybody,  so  much  the  better! 
You  cannot  give  a  baby  too  much  fresh  air;  if  he 
has  plenty  of  fuel  under  his  boilers  he  will  turn 
half  of  it  into  heat.  After  the  first  two  weeks  his 
daytime  sleeps  should  be  taken  in  the  open  air  in 
some  sheltered,  sunny  spot  so  long  as  the  tempera- 
ture is  above  freezing.  The  open  air  treatment  is 
now  relied  upon  for  sick  babies  more  than  any  other 
one  thing  except  pure  milk. 

Not  only  are  tiny,  shrivelled,  hollow-eyed  mortals 
with  summer  diarrhoea  taken  right  out  under  the 
trees  if  possible  and  kept  there  day  and  night,  but 
even  wheezing  little  gaspers  in  the  last  struggle  with 
pneumonia  and  bronchitis  are  carried  right  out,  cots 
and  all,  on  to  the  roofs  of  the  hospitals,  even  where 
the  snow  has  to  be  swept  out  of  the  way  and  banked 
up  on  both  sides  of  them  —  not  to  "catch  their 
death  of  cold,"  but  to  recover  after  they  have  been 
given  up  to  die  in  the  wards  below.  Babies  are 
little  clouds  of  water  gas  shot  through  and  through 


32  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

with  sunlight  and  whizzing  with  the  pulse  of  the 
southwest  wind;  they  revel  in  the  sunshine  and 
dance  with  the  wind,  and  fade  and  die  if  they  are 
cut  off  from  either.  Yet  we  bury  them  in  deep 
coffin-like  cradles,  imprison  them  in  air-tight,  over- 
heated rooms  poisoned  by  our  breaths,  and  when 
we  at  last  venture  to  let  them  take  the  air  in  half 
hourly  doses,  when  they  should  be  getting  it  twenty- 
five  hours  out  of  the  twenty-four,  we  wrap  and 
swaddle  and  swathe  them  as  if  they  were  Egyp- 
tian mummies.  Time  and  again  when  I  have  seen 
babies  brought  into  the  clinic  or  consulting  room, 
and  have  watched  the  process  of  unrolling  and 
peeling  off  of  the  cocoon-like  wrappings,  I  have 
wondered  when  we  were  going  to  come  down  to  the 
real  baby  and  marvelled  at  the  powers  of  infant 
endurance.  If  we  were  to  be  swathed  and  wrapped 
so  that  we  could  scarcely  move  hand  or  foot,  and 
then  either  gripped  with  arms  of  steel  immovable 
against  the  ribs  of  some  fifteen  hundred  pound 
giantess,  or  dropped  into  a  deep  trough  lined  with 
stifling  padding,  and  covered  with  a  lid  made  of 
two  mattresses,  one  feather  bed  and  an  eiderdown 
quilt,  for  all  the  world  like  a  blackbird  in  a  pie, 
we  would  think  we  were  buried  alive  and  fight  for 
dear  life  to  get  out  of  it.  That's  what  the  baby 
would  like  to  do,  but  he  can't  —  poor  little  beggar! 
And  it  is  even  worse  for  the  baby  than  it  would 
be  for  us,  because  a  baby  is  like  a  frog,  not  only 


THE  NURSERY  AGE  33 

that  it  was  hatched  under  water  but  that  he  breathes 
with  every  inch  of  his  skin  all  over  the  body.  It 
is  wrong  to  cover  any  part  of  a  baby's  body  so  that 
it  has  not  merely  plenty  of  room  to  move  but 
plenty  of  air  to  breathe,  and  it  is  little  short  of 
a  crime  to  cover  a  baby's  face  under  any  circum- 
stances short  of  zero.  Veils  and  face  wraps  of  all 
sorts  are  an  abomination,  a  relic  of  barbarism  and  a 
mark  of  superstition  in  infancy  —  as  well  as  in 
later  life. 

All  bandages,  stomach  protectors,  indeed  gar- 
ments that  touch  the  body  anywhere  except  loosely 
at  the  neck  and  wrists,  should  be  prohibited  in 
babyhood.  It  really  is  not  necessary  to  wrap  a 
baby  up  tightly  for  fear  he  will  fall  to  pieces.  Dur- 
ing the  first  few  weeks,  loose  little  slips  about  six 
inches  longer  than  he  is  and  of  the  lightest  and  soft- 
est materials,  no  matter  what,  are  what  he  needs. 
The  flannel-next-to-the-skin  delusion,  thank  heaven, 
is  melting  away  after  having  produced  more  eczema 
and  prickly  heat  and  general  disturbance  of  the 
skin  in  the  luckless  baby  than  any  other  thing 
in  the  garment  line  ever  invented  since  the  hair 
shirts  of  the  hermits.  As  soon  as  he  begins  to  out- 
grow this  garment  and  kick  his  little  pink  toes  out 
beyond  it,  split  the  lower  third  of  it  and  put  feet 
on  each  leg.  Make  them  both  as  long  and  as  loose 
as  possible  just  so  as  to  avoid  the  likelihood  of 
his  getting  both  legs  into  one  of  them.  Two  of 


34  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

these  of  light  soft  material  are  better  than  one  of 
heavier,  and  with  a  waist  cloth  should  constitute 
his  entire  fatigue  uniform.  For  dress  parade  pur- 
poses may  be  added  any  number  and  variety  of 
short  cotton,  linen  or  silk  frocks  of  whatever 
degree  of  flimsiness  and  lace  trimmings  may  most 
appeal  to  the  maternal  pride. 

When  asleep  at  any  temperature  above  50  de- 
grees one  light,  soft,  fleecy  blanket  and  one  light 
coverlet  made  of  cheesecloth  filled  with  three  or 
four  sheets  of  surgeon's  cotton  —  not  the  ordinary 
cotton  batting  of  the  shops  —  will  be  abundant 
for  cover,  with  an  additional  coverlet  in  case 
of  a  cold  night  or  wind.  A  baby  should  of  course 
have  his  own  bed  with  a  soft  but  firm  and  springy 
mattress,  firm  enough  to  remain  level  under  his 
weight  and  wide  enough  and  long  enough  so  as  to 
give  him  at  least  a  foot,  and  better  still  eighteen 
inches,  of  leeway  in  every  direction  to  travel  over 
in  his  little  wriggling  movements.  It  may  be 
enclosed  by  a  railing  to  prevent  these  excursions 
from  going  too  far,  so  as  to  end  in  a  bump.  But 
the  bars  of  this  should  be  only  just  close  enough 
together  to  prevent  his  thrusting  his  head  through 
and  falling  out. 

For  the  first  few  days  he  has  not  got  accus- 
tomed to  this  dreadfully  light  new  world  that  he 
has  come  into,  and  should  be  allowed  to  keep  in 
the  shade  most  of  the  time,  but  always  in  a  well 


THE  NljjtCSLRY  AGE  35 

lighted,  well  sunned  room.  No  air  can  be  kept 
pure  and  fit  for  human  beings  unless  it  is  exposed 
to  sunlight  frequently.  As  the  shrewd  old  Italian 
proverb  has  it:  "Where  the  sunlight  never  comes 
the  doctor  often  does."  After  exposure  to  the  light 
of  day  has  coloured  his  eyes  and  developed  the  pro- 
tective pigment  in  his  little  skin  he  can  then  be 
brought  more  and  more  into  the  sunshine,  until 
finally  by  about  the  fifth  or  sixth  week  he  should  be 
out  in  it  for  several  hours  every  day,  always  of 
course  remembering  most  carefully  to  see  that  his 
eyes  and  face  are  protected  by  a  sunshade,  or  per- 
ambulator top,  from  the  direct  glare  of  the  sun. 
After  he  is  about  five  weeks  old,  in  addition  to 
being  taken  outdoors  at  least  twice  a  day,  he  should 
be  lifted  out  of  his  cot,  stripped  to  his  pajamas  and 
laid  on  a  mattress  or  a  bed  or  on  top  of  a  table  in 
the  sunlight  in  front  of  a  window  and  allowed  to 
kick  and  wriggle  and  play  with  his  toes,  and  bang 
himself  in  the  nose  with  his  fists  to  his  heart's 
content.  A  little  later  he  should  be  stripped  to 
the  "buff"  and  put  through  this  sun  dance  at  least 
twice  a  day  —  the  room  of  course  being  kept  com- 
fortably warm  if  the  weather  be  cold;  or  in  summer- 
time the  window  can  be  opened  or,  better  still,  the 
mattress  be  laid  out  of  doors  under  a  tree.  Re- 
member it  is  not  necessary  to  pile  clothing  or  covers 
upon  a  baby  to  keep  the  cold  out.  All  that  is 
needed  is  one  or  two,  or  at  most  three,  layers  to 


36  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

keep  the  heat  in,  which  if  he  is  healthy  and  fed  he  is 
pouring  out  like  a  young  blast-furnace. 

Now  as  to  the  fuel  for  our  little  human  auto  just 
starting  out  on  his  long-distance  endurance  run 
through  life.  Babies  are  like  fledglings  in  the 
nest.  The  first  thing  they  know  how  to  do  is  to 
open  their  mouths,  and  though  they  do  not  show  it 
so  plainly,  they  are  as  nearly  "all  mouth"  as  the 
feathered  nestlings.  Like  the  nestlings  also,  no 
matter  what  their  parents  may  eat  in  the  way  of 
seeds  or  grains,  bread,  butter  or  potatoes,  they  are 
born  of  the  primitive  type,  carnivorous,  and  want 
nothing  but  meat,  living  flesh  —  white  and  liquid 
in  this  case  instead  of  red  and  solid,  but  meat 
nevertheless  and  alive.  Starch  is  about  as  much 
use  to  a  new-born  baby  as  finely  ground  sawdust, 
for  he  can  digest  less  than  one  per  cent,  of  it. 

Now  where  is  he  to  get  such  a  supply  of  white, 
liquid  protein,  still  warm  and  living?  Old  Mother 
Nature  smiles  a  tired  smile  and  says:  "Why  I 
invented  a  supply  of  that  sort  of  material  two 
million  years  ago  and  it  is  still  thirty  times  better 
than  anything  else  since  invented  to  take  its  place." 
And  Nature,  as  usual,  is  absolutely  right.  The 
baby  knows  what  it  wants,  the  mother  knows 
what  to  give  it  and  has  known  ever  since  she  was 
a  creodont  or  Titanothere  in  the  Jurassic.  How 
overwhelmingly  sound  both  their  instincts  are  may 
be  vividly  glimpsed  in  the  cold  and  gruesome 


THE  NURSERY  AGE  37 

fact  of  modern  statistics  that  the  death  rate 
in  children  under  one  year  of  age  is  from  ten 
to  forty-five  times  as  great  among  bottle-fed  children 
as  among  breast-fed. 

We  have  become  so  accustomed  to  the  idea  of 
the  bottle  as  a  part  of  the  regular  furniture  of  the 
nursery  that  it  comes  with  something  of  a  shock 
to  us  to  realize  what  a  broken  reed  and  source  of 
positive  danger  it  is.  Here  are  the  plain  brutal 
facts:  In  spite  of  the  lightly  and  even  cheerfully 
accepted  delusion  that  the  milk  gland  is  dwindling 
to  disappearance  under  civilization,  or  the  bottle 
taking  its  place,  from  sixty-five  to  seventy-five 
per  cent,  of  all  children  in  all  civilized  communities 
are  still  breast-fed.  Two  thirds  is  the  conser- 
vative estimate  —  three  fourths  nearer  the  truth. 
Yet  the  appalling  death  rate  which  occurs  during 
the  first  year  of  life,  the  much  discussed  infant 
mortality,  which  averages  from  fifteen  to  twenty 
per  cent.,  counts  three  fourths  of  its  victims 
from  the  bottle-fed  one  third.  In  other  words, 
the  death  rate  in  bottle-fed  children  the  world  over 
is,  on  the  face  of  it,  three  times  as  great  as  that 
in  breast-fed.  But  even  this  comparison  is  too 
favourable  to  the  bottle-fed  and  is  due  to  the  fact 
that  a  larger  percentage  of  bottle-fed  children  is 
found  in  the  comfortable  and  well-to-do  classes 
who  have  corresponding  advantages  in  the  way  of 
abundance  and  purity  of  food,  sanitary  surroundings, 

136314 


38  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

intelligent  nursing  and  medical  care.  When  the 
contrast  is  made  between  bottle-fed  and  breast-fed 
children  of  the  same  social  or  economic  class,  then 
the  danger  looms  up  in  its  true  proportions.  In 
the  parish  of  St.  Pancras  of  the  779  children  under 
one  year  of  age  dying  in  1905,  the  proportion  of 
the  breast-fed  dying  was  24  per  thousand:  of  the 
hand-fed  98  per  thousand,  nearly  four  times  as 
great.  Doctor  Robertson  found  in  Birmingham 
over  thirty  times  as  many  hand-fed  babies  died 
as  breast-fed.  In  Huddersfield  it  is  stated  that, 
before  the  age  of  three  months,  fifteen  hand-fed 
babies  die  as  compared  with  one  breast-fed.  In 
Brighton,  Doctor  Newsholme,  now  chief  medical 
adviser  of  the  English  government,  found  that 
of  babies  dying  from  diarrhoea  only  six  and  a 
half  per  cent,  were  breast-fed,  while  eighty  per 
cent,  were  hand-fed.  Other  observers  report 
exactly  the  same  findings,  and  our  American  in- 
fant death  rates  corroborate  these  figures  save  that 
the  proportions  are  not  quite  so  great. 

There  is  abundant  statistical  basis  for  the  state- 
ment that  the  baby  who  can  be  breast-fed  has 
ten  times  the  chances  of  survival  that  he  would  if 
he  were  bottle-fed.  It  is  a  most  serious  respon- 
sibility to  refuse  to  nurse  a  child  when  even  th«. 
barest  possibility  of  ability  to  do  so  exists. 

Observers  from  all  over  the  civilized  world 
testify  to  the  gratifying  fact  that  in  the  wcrkLv 


THE  NURSERY  AGE  39 

classes  as  a  whole,  except  those  in  which  the  mothers 
themselves  are  employed  in  industrial  occupation, 
and  in  the  rural  and  small  town  population  gen- 
erally, from  fifty  to  ninety  per  cent,  of  all  children 
are  still  nourished  by  Nature's  method,  the  general 
average  being  about  sixty-five  per  cent.  The 
lowest  percentage  is  to  be  found  in  two  social  ex- 
tremes, the  very  rich,  where  the  mothers  are  pre- 
vented by  the  pressure  of  their  social  duties  from 
attending  to  such  vulgar  and  insignificant  details 
as  the  feeding  of  their  own  children,  and  the  very 
poor,  where  even  the  mother's  wage  is  needed  to 
keep  body  and  soul  together  and  she  has  neither  the 
time  to  nurse  her  baby  nor  the  food  that  will  make 
her  milk  of  any  value  to  it  if  she  should.  In  both  of 
these  unfortunate  classes,  the  percentage  of  breast- 
fed children  may  fall  as  low  as  fifteen  or  twenty  per 
cent.,  but  it  is  only  in  the  latter  one  that  the  death 
rate  rises  in  proportion.  A  high  infant  mortality 
is  one  of  the  many  "blessednesses"  of  the  poor. 

It  might  at  first  sight  be  supposed  that  much  if 
not  all  of  this  decline  of  natural  nutritive  power 
was  involuntary  and  due  to  inability.  But  again 
the  figures  refute  our  fears  of  degeneracy.  This 
question,  as  becomes  its  vital  importance,  has  now 
been  taken  up  by  investigators  in  all  parts  of  the 
civilized  world  and  in  all  classes  of  society  with 
astonishing  but  most  uniform  conclusions  —  viz., 
that  between  ninety  and  ninety-five  per  cent,  of 


40  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

all  human  mothers  are  still  abundantly  able  to 
nurse  their  own  children  if  they  are  willing  and  if 
they  have  the  time  and  the  proper  feeding  to  enable 
them  to  do  so.  From  Berlin,  from  Dresden,  from 
Florence,  from  Paris,  from  London  and  Liverpool, 
from  New  York  and  Boston  come  the  cheering 
returns  that  in  no  case  has  it  been  found  that  more 
than  ten  per  cent,  of  the  mothers  in  any  class  of 
society  are  unable  to  nurse  their  children,  and  sel- 
dom more  than  five  per  cent.  Not  only  so,  but 
since  within  the  past  five  or  six  years  the  vital  im- 
portance of  this  proceeding  has  been  recognized, 
physicians  at  maternity  hospitals  and  at  children's 
clinics  all  over  the  world  are  reporting  that,  where- 
as ten  years  ago  only  forty,  fifty  or  sixty  per  cent, 
of  the  mothers  under  their  control  nursed  their 
children,  now  seventy,  eighty  and  ninety  per  cent, 
do  so  habitually,  with  a  corresponding  reduction 
of  the  death  rate  and  sickness  rate  in  the  children. 
The  returns  are  just  as  favourable  from  physicians 
whose  practice  is  among  the  wealthiest  classes  in 
London,  Berlin  and  New  York  as  it  is  from  those 
in  dispensaries  and  clinics. 

The  only  reason  why  the  modern  mother  does 
not  nourish  her  own  child  is  that  for  various  reasons 
she  finds  it  inconvenient  to  do  so,  and  not  because 
she  has  lost  the  power.  First  and  foremost  among 
these  reasons  for  disinclination  is  the  lamentable 
delusion  that  babies  can  be  raised  just  as  well  on 


THE  NURSERY  AGE  41 

cow's  milk  or  some  modification  of  it.  When  this 
false  premise  has  once  been  accepted  then  any 
trifling  matter  of  convenience,  of  indisposition,  of 
pressure  of  other  engagments,  of  aesthetic  consid- 
erations will  suffice.  A  singular  sense  of  false 
modesty  often  exists  in  otherwise  intelligent  and 
most  devoted  mothers  that  the  carrying  out  of  the 
function  is  something  to  be  ashamed  of,  something 
that  they  do  not  like  the  public,  or  even  their  inti- 
mate friends  to  suspect  that  they  indulge  in,  some- 
thing that,  as  they  frankly  express  it,  "makes  them 
feel  like  animals."  The  modern  mother  is  just  as 
devoted  to  her  baby  and  not  only  would,  but  does, 
sacrifice  herself  for  it  with  as  little  hesitation  as 
the  mother  of  any  age,  but,  believing  that  the  baby 
is  just  as  well  off  on  cow's  milk,  she  has  allowed 
minor  and  often  trivial  considerations  to  divert  her 
from  the  discharge  of  her  most  important  duty. 

This  is  hardly  to  be  wondered  at,  for  to  most  of 
us  milk  is  milk  just  as  "eggs  is  eggs."  Indeed,  it 
is  only  since  our  laboratories  have  begun  their 
most  careful  analytical  study  of  cow's  milk  that 
we  have  begun  to  realize  its  enormous  differences 
from  real  baby's  food.  It  ought  to  have  been 
sufficient  to  remember  that  one  milk  has  been  fitted 
for  hundreds  of  thousands  of  years  to  grow  a  calf, 
the  other  to  grow  a  baby.  That,  for  instance,  while 
the  human  baby  grows  about  fifty  per  cent,  bigger 
during  the  first  six  months  of  his  little  life,  the 


42  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

bovine  baby  grows  nearly  five  hundred  per  cent,  in 
the  same  time.  Nature  would  be  a  fool  if  she  pro- 
vided the  same  kind  of  food  for  both.  As  a  matter 
of  fact,  as  we  should  have  expected,  the  two  milks 
vary  nearly  one  hundred  per  cent,  in  every  respect, 
except  the  fat.  It  is  of  course  impossible  to  enter 
into  the  details,  but  fortunately  it  is  not  necessary. 
It  may  be  roughly  summed  up  in  two  statements: 
First,  that  the  protein  or  "meat"  of  cow's  milk 
is  double  that  of  human  milk  and  the  proportion  of 
it  which  is  in  the  form  of  tough,  indigestible  casein 
(literally  "  chee&in, "  from  the  Latin  word  of  that 
meaning)  is  nearly  six  times  as  great.  This  is  why 
it  makes  such  a  tough,  hard,  indigestible  curd  in 
the  unfortunate  baby's  stomach,  which  is  not  in 
the  least  fitted  to  digest  it.  No  amount  of  dilution 
or  modification  will  overcome  this  radical  defect. 
Incidentally;  the  sugar  in  cow's  milk  is  only  half 
the  required  amount  for  a  baby,  so  that  in  pro- 
portion as  you  get  the  protein  right  by  diluting,  you 
get  the  sugar  wrong,  but  this  can  be  remedied  by 
adding  milk-sugar. 

The  other  general  statement  is  more  fundamental 
yet  —  that  every  single  ingredient  of  the  cow's 
milk  is  wrong  for  the  baby's  stomach;  its  protein 
is  bovine  protein,  its  fat  is  bovine  fat,  more  like 
suet  than  the  delicate  human  fat  required;  its  salts 
are  of  the  kind  and  in  the  proportions  required  for 
a  calf  instead  of  a  baby.  What  the  delicate  stomach 


THE  NURSERY  AGE  43 

of  the  baby  needs  and  is  "geared"  for  is  human 
protein,  human  fat  and  humanized  sugar  and  salts. 
It  can  hardly  be  over-stated  how  vitally  important 
it  is,  not  merely  for  the  baby's  survival,  but  for  his 
future  vigour  and  growth  that  he  should  obtain 
during  the  first  three  or  four  weeks  of  his  life  a 
humanized  supply  of  food.  Even  if  it  is  only  pos- 
sible, for  physical  reasons,  for  him  to  receive  one 
half,  or  one  third,  or  one  fifth  of  his  nourishment 
in  this  form,  it  is  worth  every  effort  made  to  obtain 
it.  After  he  has  reached  the  fourth  week  he  becomes 
capable  of  tackling  the  tough  curd  of  cow's  milk  with 
comparative  ease  and  this  can  be  made  an  increasing 
element  in  his  diet  if  circumstances  demand  it. 

But  the  feeling  of  thoughtful  pediatrists,  or  special- 
ists in  children's  diseases,  is  coming  more  and  more 
to  the  view  that  the  very  perfection  of  our  methods 
for  modifying  cow's  milk  and  controlling  its  purity 
have  now  become  a  source  of  danger  in  that  they 
lead  us  to  think  that  we  may  neglect  breast  feeding 
with  impunity.  The  best  and  most  successful  "milk 
depots"  in  England  and  in  Europe  are  devoting 
themselves  more  and  more  exclusively  to  the 
encouragement  and  promotion  of  breast  feeding 
and  are  finding,  not  only  that  the  babies  are  thriv- 
ing much  better  but  that  it  actually  costs  less  to 
feed  the  mother  than  it  does  to  feed  the  child. di- 
rectly. The  best  milk  depot  nowadays  is  the  one 
that  uses  the  least  cow's  milk,  and  as  Doctor  Sykes 


44  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

puts  it:  "The  best  way  to  humanize  cow's  milk 
is  to  pass  it  through  the  body  of  the  mother." 

If  this  be  our  attitude  toward  even  the  most 
carefully  modified  cow's  milk,  what  shall  we  say  of 
its  commercial  substitutes  and  parodies,  infant's 
foods?  —  that  the  majority  of  them  are  little  better 
than  sanitary  nuisances,  and  that  I  hope  to  see  the 
day  when  their  manufacture,  advertisement  and  sale 
will  be  prohibited  by  law.  The  sole  virtues  of  most 
of  them  are  that  they  seem  cheap,  are  convenient 
to  handle  and  save  trouble  for  the  indifferent  nurse 
and  careless  doctor.  They  are  excellent  things  in 
their  place,  but  their  place  is  on  the  shelf  in  the 
drug  store,  not  in  the  nursery.  The  only  exception 
is  some  of  the  pre-digested  foods,  which  may  be 
temporarily  used  to  tide  a  weakly  baby  over  a 
strain.  But  even  here  it  is  much  better  to  get 
cow's  milk  and  peptonize  it  yourself.  They  are  none 
of  them  the  equal  of  good,  properly  modified  cow's 
milk,  either  in  nutritive  value  or  in  digestibility, 
with  the  partial  exception  of  the  pre-digested  forms. 

Those  that  are  prepared  from  milk  and  repre- 
sent something  even  approaching  to  real  foods  for 
a  baby  are  from  five  to  twenty  times  as  expensive 
as  milk  in  porportion  to  their  nutritive  value,  with 
no  counterbalancing  advantages  except  being  easy 
to  prepare.  Those  which  do  not  represent  milk, 
and  they  are  the  vast  majority,  owe  such  virtues  as 
they  may  possess;  the  milk  with  which  they  are 


THE  NURSERY  AGE  45 

mixed,  and  the  mixture  when  made,  is  inferior  to 
plain  milk,  on  account  of  the  excess  of  sugar  or 
starch.  The  majority  of  them,  in  order  to  increase 
the  profits  of  their  sale,  contain  large  quantities  of 
starch,  indeed  some  of  them  consist  chiefly  of  this 
interesting  food,  which,  though  good  food  for  an 
adult  is  almost  useless  as  a  food  for  a  baby  under 
six  or  even  nine  months  of  age.  Careful  analysis 
have  shown  that  a  baby  up  to  three  months  of  age 
can  utilize  in  its  food  not  more  than  half  of  one  per 
cent,  of  starch,  and  that  anything  above  this  amount 
is  injurious,  as  a  baby's  saliva  and  intestinal  juices 
contain  little  or  no  starchy  digest  ferments  until 
after  this  age.  Yet  many  of  the  best  known  and 
most  extensively  advertised  of  these  foods  contain 
from  seventy  five  to  eighty-two  per  cent,  of  starch. 

Finally  they  are  all  killed  foods,  killed  in  the  proc- 
ess of  drying,  baking,  sterilizing  and  preparing, 
while  the  baby  needs  its  food  alive;  and  as  a  prac- 
tical consequence  it  has  been  found  these  ten  years 
past  that  babies  fed  exclusively  and  even  too  largely 
for  long  periods  on  any  of  them  develop  scurvy 
or  rickets.  The  bottle  is  a  danger  signal  in  the 
nursery,  but  the  can  of  infant's  food  is  a  "hoodoo" 
—  a  far  surer  sign  of  scurvy,  if  not  of  death,  in 
the  family  within  a  year  than  a  black  cat  or  a 
broken  mirror. 

If  the  human  budlet  is  given  plenty  of  sunlight 
and  fresh  air  and  sound  food  he  will  grow  as  irresist- 


46  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

iblyas  the  cherry  sapling  lifted  the  millstone  through 
whose  central  hole  it  sprouted  out.  A  most  important 
danger  signal  is  failure  or  arrest  of  this  growth. 
Every  baby  should  be  weighed  at  least  once  a  week 
during  his  first  six  months,  and  once  or  twice  a 
month  for  the  next  three  years.  Nothing  will 
furnish  better  proof  of  the  vigour  of  his  health  and 
the  adequacy  of  the  care  that  he  is  getting.  Roughly 
speaking,  he  should  gain  about  a  pound  a  month 
during  his  first  year  (fourteen  pounds);  during  his 
second  year  a  little  more  than  half  a  pound  per 
month  (eight  pounds).  It  may  simplify  matters 
to  remember  that  his  growth  in  length  or  height 
should  be  half  as  many  inches  as  his  weight  in 
pounds,  viz.,  about  half  an  inch  a  month  during 
first  year;  a  little  over  a  quarter  of  an  inch  a 
month  during  his  second,  and  about  two  inches  a 
year  after  that.  If  your  baby  is  elongating  and 
increasing  in  specific  gravity  at  about  this  rate 
or  indeed,  under  ordinary  circumstances,  within 
twenty  per  cent,  of  it  either  above  or  below,  as  he 
will  usually  be  doing  eight  times  out  of  ten,  you 
may  set  your  mind  at  rest  about  his  future. 

Other  indications  of  growth  and  healthy  develop- 
ment are  not  quite  so  easy  to  determine  and  keep 
track  of.  The  main  difficulty  is  that  we  do  not 
properly  realize  how  "far  back,"  so  to  speak,  our 
babies  are  born.  For  instance,  because  we  can  see 
their  tiny  little  pink  sea-shells  of  ears  we  are  sure 


THE  NURSERY  AGE  47 

that  they  ought  to  hear  from  the  day  that  they  are 
born,  forgetting  that  for  the  first  three  or  ten  days 
after  birth  the  average  baby  is  practically  deaf 
and  pays  no  attention  whatever  to  sounds  except 
they  may  be  loud  or  rumbling  enough  to  jar  his 
little  body  or  head.  As  a  general  thing  it  is  of 
little  use  to  whistle  or  snap  your  fingers  to  attract 
a  baby's  attention  until  he  is  nearly  three  or  four 
months  old,  though  he  will  notice  loud  and  disturb- 
ing noises  as  early  as  his  fourth  week. 

Similarly  because  the  midget's  eyes  are  open 
the  very  first  time  that  we  see  him  we  are  quite 
sure  that  he  can  see  from  birth.  As  a  matter  of 
fact  all  that  he  has  is  the  vaguest  perception  of  light, 
and  that  light  must  vary  in  intensity  or  be  in  rapid 
movement  before  he  can  recognize  it  at  all,  up  to 
about  two  or  three  weeks  of  age.  At  about  four 
weeks  he  should,  normally,  begin  to  follow  objects 
with  his  eyes,  but  many  perfectly  healthy  infants 
pay  little  or  no  attention  to  even  moving  objects 
unless  they  be  bright  coloured  or  vividly  illumin- 
ated, until  four  or  five  months  of  age.  As  for  the 
idea  that  your  precious  offspring  can  recognize 
you,  still  less  read  the  extraordinary  contortions 
of  your  countenance  when  you  make  faces  at  him 
short  of  four  or  five  months  —  why,  he  doesn't 
even  recognize  you  as  a  feature  in  the  landscape 
and  couldn't  tell  you  from  a  red  tablecloth  or  a 
bed  post  to  save  his  life.  He  has  absolutely  no 


48  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

notion  of  the  outlines  of  objects  or  even  of  objects 
as  such  until,  about  the  age  of  from  three  to  five 
months,  he  begins  to  reach  out  his  little  front  paw 
and  clutch  the  shiny  or  vividly  coloured  clouds 
that  are  floating  round  him. 

A  baby  should  be  able  to  hold  up  his  head  at 
four  months  and  to  sit  up  unsupported  at  nine, 
but  there  is  no  reason  to  fear  for  either  his  intellect 
or  his  bodily  vigour  if  these  triumphal  feats  be 
delayed  until  six  and  twelve  months  respectively- 
Only  one  thing  is  really  significant  in  the  first  few 
weeks  of  life  and  that  is  feeble  or  absent  hand  grasp. 
The  normal  child  should  be  able  to  grasp  firmly  — 
clutch  is  the  better  word  —  a  finger,  pencil  or  other 
object  of  suitable  shape  rubbed  across  his  tiny  palm 
within  the  first  ten  days.  Indeed,  as  is  well  known, 
babies  are  born  literally  where  the  old  "Rock-a-Bye 
Cradle"  swings,  in  the  treetops,  as  they  can  not 
only  clutch  like  little  forceps,  but  swing  supported 
by  their  hands  three  to  five  times  as  long  as  a  healthy 
adult  man  can  without  training. 

Another  danger  signal  is  backwardness  in  learn- 
ing to  walk,  or,  as  it  should  be  expressed,  back- 
wardness in  growing  to  walk.  This  triumphant  art 
of  navigation  should  be  mastered  by  about  twelve 
months  of  age,  but  practically  it  varies  over  wide 
limits.  Some  children  start  darting  about  like 
little  water  bugs  at  ten  months,  while  others, 
through  perfectly  healthy  and  vigorous,  may  stol- 


THE  NURSERY  AGE  49 

idly  content  themselves  with  slower  methods  of 
the  wriggle  and  crawl  until  fifteen,  sixteen,  or 
eighteen  months,  then,  within  a  week,  be  running 
all  over  the  house.  In  any  case  it  is  a  matter  of 
growth,  not  training,  and  nothing  that  can  be  done 
in  the  way  of  teaching  or  helping  the  child  to  walk 
will  expedite  matters  in  more  than  the  slightest 
degree,  and  the  more  such  interference  is  the  greater 
the  danger  there  is  to  do  the  child  harm  in  the 
direction  of  bow-leggedness  or  weak  knees. 

Your  baby  grew  from  a  tiny  little  droplet  of 
animal  jelly,  first  into  the  shape  of  a  worm;  then  in 
the  shape  of  a  fish  with  gills  and  fin-like  buds  in- 
stead of  arms  and  legs;  then  he  became  a  mammal 
with  a  well  marked  tail;  he  was  born  a  quadruped 
and  in  due  process  of  time  he  will  as  inevitably 
become  a  biped,  a  speaking  and  a  tool-using  creature. 
All  he  needs  is  proper  surroundings  in  the  shape 
of  air  and  food,  and  the  privilege  of  your  intelligent 
companionship,  so  that  he  can  do  a  little  imitating. 
Given  these  he  will  arrive,  as  the  French  say,  at  the 
full  stature  and  powers  of  manhood  as  inevitably  as 
the  sun  rises  and  sets,  unless  prevented  by  death 
or  by  crippling  disease. 

One  other  dread  in  the  nursery  might  be  men- 
tioned, fortunately  a  rare  one,  but  whose  possibility 
is  much  worried  over  by  anxious  mothers,  and  that  is 
convulsions.  As  compared  with  adults,  convulsions 
occur  more  easily  in  children  because  their  little 


50  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

powers  of  expressing  irritation  or  removing  its  cause 
have  not  been  fully  developed  and  the  energy 
which,  in  a  grown-up  would  be  used  for  swearing 
or  fighting,  "explodes"  in  this  aimless  outburst  of 
muscular  twitching.  They  do  not  occur  in  more 
than  a  small  percentage  of  children  and  when  they 
do  occur  are  rather  significant.  Far  the  commonest 
cause  of  them  is  some  fever  or  other  infection  of 
which  they  are  the  first  striking  symptom.  Scarlet 
fever,  measles,  whooping  cough,  diphtheria,  diar- 
rhoea, cholera  infantum,  bronchitis,  or  pneumonia 
may  all  be  ushered  in  by  convulsions.  It  was  long 
believed  that  convulsions  came  from  the  stomach 
and  that  taking  excessive  amounts,  or  indigestible 
articles  of  food  would  give  rise  to  a  convulsion. 
This  belief,  however,  did  not  stand  the  test  of  in- 
vestigation, but  was  probably  due  to  the  fact  that 
the  commonest  source  of  infection  in  the  infant  is 
through  food.  These  convulsions  of  digestive  origin 
are  really  due  to  germs  or  their  toxins  which  have 
been  taken  in  the  food  and,  in  fact,  often  the  first 
warnings  of  a  sharp  attack  of  infantile  diarrhoea, 
which  is  an  infectious  disease  nine  times  out  of  ten. 
Diseases  which  are  ushered  in  by  convulsions 
are  apt  to  be  of  a  very  severe  and  fatal  type,  hence 
the  impression  which  has  grown  up  that  convulsions 
in  children  are  apt  to  be  fatal.  As  a  matter  of 
fact  only  a  small  percentage  are  fatal,  and  even  in 
these  the  death  is  due  to  the  disease  of  which  the 


THE  NURSERY  AGE  51 

convulsion  was  only  a  symptom.  Another  per- 
centage of  convulsions,  a  small  one,  is  due  to  tuber- 
culosis of  the  brain  and  its  coverings,  known  as 
tubercular  meningitis;  while  about  the  same  pro- 
portion are  due  to  syphilis  and  malaria. 

Not  merely  has  the  fatality  of  convulsions  been 
both  exaggerated  and  misinterpreted,  but  their 
effect  upon  the  mental  development  of  the  child 
as  well.  It  was  quite  commonly  believed  until 
recently  that  an  attack  of  convulsions  in  infancy 
might  blight  the  child's  whole  future  development 
and  leave  it  either  epileptic  or  feeble-minded.  The 
real  fact  of  the  matter  was  just  the  reverse  —  viz., 
that  many  cases  of  epilepsy  begin  in  infancy  and 
early  childhood,  and  the  convulsion  which  "caused" 
the  succession  of  fits  following  it  all  through  life,  is 
itself  the  first  epileptic  seizure.  The  stories  for 
instance,  of  children  having  been  thrown  into  con- 
vulsions and  made  epileptic  and  feeble-minded  ever 
after  by  some  particular  food  given  them  —  most 
commonly  meat  —  had  for  their  basis  this  belief 
that  convulsions  were  due  to  errors  of  digestion 
and  caused  epilepsy.  Not  more  than  one  per  cent. 
of  convulsions  in  infancy  are  followed  either  by 
epilepsy  or  feeble-mindedness.  While  on  the  other 
hand,  data  gathered  in  homes  for  the  feeble-minded, 
and  colonies  for  the  epileptic  show  that  something 
like  forty  per  cent,  of  both  of  these  unfortunate 
classes  suffered  from  convulsions  in  childhood. 


CHAPTER  IV 

THE    SWEET    TOOTH 

WHY  do  we  always  couple"  sweetness  and 
light"  —  with  sweetness  in  the  lead  — • 
as  our  highest  conception  of  spiritual 
development?  Why  is  it  that  in  all  literatures 
and  legends  "sweet"  is  invariably  associated  with 
"sound,"  wholesome  —  the  scent  of  flowers,  the 
song  of  birds,  the  golden  sunlight  —  with  everything 
that  is  pure  and  fresh  and  sound  ?  Why  is  a  sweet- 
heart the  most  delightful  form  of  cardiac  motor 
that  can  be  begged,  borrowed,  or  stolen  anywhere? 
Why  don't  we  say  "sour  as  a  May  morning,"  "al- 
kaline" as  the  breath  of  kine,  "bitter"  as  the 
nightingale's  song,  "nutritious"  as  the  new-mown 
hay?  Because  deep  down,  instinctively  in  the  heart 
of  us,  we  feel,  no  matter  what  the  preachers  or 
philosophers  or  the  health  journals  may  say,  that, 
to  paraphrase  Browning's  defense  of  beauty, 

If  you  get  sweetness  and  naught  else  beside, 
You  get  about  the  best  thing  God  invents. 

Sweetness  is  to  the  taste  what  beauty  is  to  trie 
eye  —  nature's  stamp  of  approval  and  certificate 
of  wholesomeness.  It  is  one  of  the  most  universal 

52 


THE  SWEET  TOOTH  53 

flavours  of  foodstuffs  known.  Over  one  half  of 
our  real  foods  taste  sweet  or  sweetish  —  that  is, 
they  contain  sugar  in  some  form.  About  one  third 
taste  salty;  not  more  than  one  tenth  taste  either 
bitter  or  sour.  The  experience  of  millions  of  years, 
reaching  far  beyond  even  our  arboreal  ancestors, 
has  taught  us  beyond  possibility  of  forgetting  that, 
while  there  are  hundreds  of  things  that  taste  salty 
which  have  no  food  value,  and  scores  of  things  that 
taste  bitter  that  not  only  have  no  food  value  but  are 
even  poisonous;  and  thousands  of  things,  like  leaves 
and  sawdust  and  cocoanut  matting,  which  have 
no  food  value  at  all  until  advertised  as  breakfast 
foods,  there  are  comparatively  few  things  that 
taste  sweet  which  are  not  real  foods.  A  very  few 
of  these  sweet-tasting  things,  while  real  foods,  are 
also  poisonous,  but  these  we  soon  learn  to  detect 
and  beware  of. 

It  was  only  in  comparatively  recent  years  that  we 
discovered  and  realized  how  exceedingly  wide- 
spread sugar  in  some  form  was  in  all  of  our  food 
substances.  That  universal  and  omnipresent  prim- 
itive staff  of  life  —  milk  —  upon  which  every  mam- 
mal that  walks  or  climbs,  or  swims,  must  begin  its 
existence,  whether  it  is  to  wear  fur  or  bristles  or 
clothes,  whether  it  is  to  be  carnivorous,  herbivorous, 
omnivorous,  or  fletcherite,  contains  sugar  as  one  of 
its  three  most  important  elements.  Nor  is  this, 
as  is  popularly  supposed,  a  mere  trace,  barely  enough 


54  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

to  give  the  characteristic  sweetish  taste  of  milk, 
but  it  is  a  full-blown  member  of  the  great  trinity 
of  nutrient  materials,  sugar  (carbohydrate),  meat 
(protein)  and  fat,  and  constitutes  nearly  one  third 
of  the  nutritive  value  of  this  liquid  food  —  the  best 
liquid  food,  it  may  be  remarked  in  passing,  that  has 
ever  yet  been  invented,  the  only  one  on  which  life 
can  be  maintained  for  prolonged  periods;  while  the 
utmost  ingenuity  of  the  chemist  and  the  manu- 
facturer has  never  yet  been  able  to  produce  another 
liquid  food,  no  matter  what  it  may  shine  forth 
as  in  the  advertisements,  which,  bulk  for  bulk,  is 
equal  in  nutritive  value  to  milk. 

Milk  is  literally  liquid  flesh,  containing  all  our 
body  stuffs  in  exactly  the  proportion  in  which  they 
are  required  in  childhood,  and  needing  only  a 
little  sugar  or  starch  added  to  be  the  same  for  adult 
life.  It  is  the  only  infant's  food  on  which  infants 
will  live,  though  they  can  be  made  to  feed  on  a 
variety  of  others.  The  curse  and  cause  of  infants' 
foods  is  a  vegetable  product  —  starch  —  whose  sole 
merit  is  its  cheapness,  and  which  has  slain  more 
innocents  than  a  hundred  Herods.  Every  animal, 
and  for  the  matter  of  that,  bird  or  fish,  whatever 
it  may  become  in  later  life,  gets  its  start  as  a  meat- 
eater —  a  carnivore;  and  however  well  or  ill  adult 
human  beings  may  be  able  to  stand  vegetarianism, 
if  it  were  enforced  in  the  nursery  it  would  wipe  out 
the  human  race  in  a  single  generation. 


THE  SWEET  TOOTH  55 

There  can  be  few  better  illustrations  of  the 
impossibility  —  I  had  almost  said  absurdity  —  of 
attempting  to  draw  hard  and  fast  chemical  lines 
through  our  menus  than  the  distribution  of  sugar. 
Not  only  does  the  one  food  which  we  have  all  had 
to  begin  life  on  —  milk  —  contain  it  in  considerable 
amounts,  and  all  our  starchy  foods,  cereals,  fruits, 
tubers,  etc.,  depend  upon  it  for  their  sole  nutritive 
value,  but  every  known  meat,  fish,  flesh,  fowl,  or 
"gude  red  herrin'"  also  contains  it  in  appreciable 
amounts,  and  some  of  them,  such  as  liver,  strange 
as  it  may  seem,  contain  it  in  as  large  amounts  as 
many  vegetables  or  fruits.  When  we  speak  of 
"meat"  or  of  the  flesh  of  animals,  we  usually  mean 
the  muscles,  which  eons  of  experience  have  taught  us 
to  be  the  safest  and  wholesomest  part  of  the  animal 
body  to  eat,  least  liable  to  contain  either  disease 
germs  or  ptomaines.  Every  tiniest  fibre  of  this 
muscle-stuff  contains  both  glucose  and  a  special 
sugar  known  as  muscle-sugar,  or  inosite,  whose 
presence  gives  the  peculiarly  sweet  and  juicy  taste 
to  the  better  cuts  of  beef,  and  the  flesh  of  fat  or  young 
animals,  which  is  more  abundantly  stored  with  this 
substance  than  that  of  old,  lean,  or  hard-worked 
ones.  Much  of  the  dryness  and  tastelessness  of 
game  killed  either  early  in  the  spring,  after  the 
long  winter's  famine,  or  in  the  tropics  or  on  the 
plains  at  the  close  of  a  long  period  of  drought,  is 
due  to  the  absence  of  this  sugar,  which  has  been 


56  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

burned  up  by  the  animal  in  the  process  of  starva- 
tion. 

Many  savage  tribes,  having,  perforce,  to  live,  not 
upon  the  well-fatted  and  little-exercised  beeves  and 
wethers  of  our  farmyards,  but  upon  the  lean,  hun- 
gry, and  everlastingly  active  and  "India-rubbery" 
antelope,  mountain  goat,  and  jack-rabbit,  not  to 
mention  coyote,  mink,  muskrat  and  other  such 
"small  deer,"  have  formed  the  habit  of  cooking 
their  meat  and  flavouring  their  stews  with  maple- 
sugar  or  honey,  just  as  we  would  use  salt  or  spices. 
Indeed,  almost  every  civilized  menu  shows  traces 
and  survivals  of  this  strange  primitive  mixture, 
such  as  apple  sauce  with  pork,  currant  jelly  with 
mutton,  cranberries  with  turkey,  prunes  with  roast 
duck,  mince  meat;  in  Italy,  pears  with  stewed  veal; 
in  Germany,  cherries  and  strawberries  in  cabbage 
soup;  in  Sweden,  raisins  in  meat  stew. 

This  wide-spread  prevalence  of  sugar  in  the  mus- 
cles and  other  tissues  of  the  animal  body  everywhere 
—  the  physiological  reason  for  which  we  shall  con- 
sider later  —  helps  to  explain  the  extraordinary 
prevalence  of  the  sweet  tooth  throughout  the  animal 
kingdom.  It  is  not  perhaps  generally  known, 
except  to  those  who  have  had  much  to  do  with 
wild  animals  in  captivity  or  in  their  native  haunts, 
but  there  is  scarcely  an  animal  of  any  class,  not  even 
the  purest  carnivore  which  does  not  crave  sugar  in 
some  form  and  cannot  be  taught  to  eat  it  greedily. 


THE  SWEET  TOOTH  57 

It  may  decline  it  at  first,  because  it  has  no  smell. 
It  must  be  tasted  to  be  recognized. 

It  may  be  remarked  in  passing  that  this  is  simply 
another  illustration  of  the  biologic  absurdity  of  an 
exclusive  diet  of  any  sort,  whether  vegetarian, 
fruitarian,  "nutty-arian,"  or  raw-fooder.  There  is 
no  such  thing  in  the  animal  kingdom  as  a  pure 
vegetarian,  all  of  us  having  begun  on  milk;  not  even 
in  the  bird  class,  for  every  nestling  is  carnivorous  — 
a  grub,  insect,  or  fish  eater  —  and  there  is  no  such 
thing  as  an  exclusive  meat-eater,  or  carnivore,  with 
the  possible  exception  of  a  few  blood-suckers  like 
the  weasel  and  the  vampire  bat. 

If  you  have  any  doubts  as  to  the  sweet  tooth  of 
wild  animals,  even  including  those  that  are  usually 
classed  as  carnivore,  or  beasts  of  prey,  just  go  to  a 
patch  of  sand-cherries  on  the  plains  of  Wyoming  or 
western  Nebraska  in  the  fruit  season  and  look  at 
the  prints  on  the  sandy  soil  under  the  little  bushes, 
and  if  you  know  anything  of  woodcraft  you  will  need 
no  further  evidence  to  convince  you  that  this  is  the 
Waldorf-Astoria  for  half  the  surrounding  country- 
side. The  main  web  of  the  network  of  crossing  and 
recrossing  trails  and  footprints  is  made  up  of  the 
tiny  pads  of  prairie  squirrels,  marmots,  jack-rabbits, 
and  the  like;  but  striding  boldly  across  the  pattern 
in  every  direction,  you  will  find  the  Bertillon  prints 
of  scores  of  coyotes,  of  swifts  or  prairie-foxes,  of 
mink,  of  skunk,  and  of  badger,  while  if  near  enough 


58  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

to  a  box  canon  or  a  pass  in  the  foot-hills  leading  up 
to  the  mountains,  you  will  find  the  big  saucer-like 
print  of  the  mountain  lion,  or  the  huge  paw  of  the 
cinnamon,  or  the  grizzly.  A  blackberry  patch  in 
the  Adirondacks  or  a  salmon-berry  or  salal  thicket 
in  the  Cascades,  the  Siskyous  or  the  Sierras  will 
show  the  autographs  of  every  inhabitant  of  the 
surrounding  woods  and  waters. 

One  of  the  most  interesting  developments  in  the 
chemistry  of  foods  has  been  the  discovery  that  not 
merely  do  all  staple  vegetable  foods  either  consist 
chiefly  of,  or  contain  starch-sugars,  such  as  the  grains, 
nuts,  fruits,  etc.,  but  that  our  pure  animal  foods 
—  meats,  fish,  game,  etc.  (proteins),  contain  from 
twenty-five  to  fifty-five  per  cent,  of  their  energy 
in  the  form  of  animal  sugar  (glycocol),  or  animal 
starch  (carbohydrate).  So  that  any  diet  which  it  is 
possible  to  discover  in  a  state  of  nature  contains 
considerable  amounts  of  sugar-starch.  This  is 
interestingly  shown  in  a  most  unexpected  quarter 
by  that  serious  and  well-known  disease,  diabetes, 
whose  most  striking  feature,  of  course,  is  the  escape 
of  considerable  quantities  of  sugar  from  the  body, 
through  the  kidneys.  This,  with  perfectly  natural 
but  infantile  logic,  was  first  believed  to  be  due  to 
the  eating  of  excessive  amounts  of  sugar  in  the  food, 
but  this  delusion  was  quickly  exploded,  as  it  was 
found  that  the  sugar  of  diabetes  came  chiefly  from 
the  starch  of  the  food.  Our  next  "grammar-grade" 


THE  SWEET  TOOTH  59 

step  was  therefore  to  cut  starch  entirely  out  of  the 
dietary  of  the  diabetic;  but,  much  to  our  surprise, 
while  this  would  for  a  time  prevent  the  appearance 
of  sugar,  as  the  disease  progressed  the  sugar  would 
reappear,  even  upon  a  diet  absolutely  free  from  either 
sugar  or  starch  in  any  form. 

We  were  puzzled  to  know  how  the  diabetic  body 
could  manage  to  make  sugar  out  of  proteids  until 
a  more  careful  analysis  of  muscle  fibre  and  the  curd 
of  milk  showed  that  both  of  these  pure  proteid 
substances  contained  a  large  per  cent,  of  starch- 
sugar  and  that  the  patient  was  also  breaking  down 
and  burning  up  his  own  tissues  in  the  desperate 
endeavour  to  replace  the  sugar  cut  out  of  his  food. 
This  was  proved  to  be  true  both  by  weighing  the 
patient  and  discovering  that  the  loss  of  his  body 
weight  corresponded  quite  accurately  to  the  amount 
of  sugar  which  he  excreted,  and  also  by  giving  him 
large  extra  amounts  of  meat  in  his  dietary  and  find- 
ing that  much  of  the  sugar-starch  contained  in  it 
appeared  as  sugar  in  the  urine.  The  real  disease 
and  fatal  defect  of  the  diabetic  is,  precisely,  his 
inability  to  burn  sugar;  and  his  steady  decline  and 
almost  certain  ultimate  death  are  a  painfully  vivid 
illustration  of  the  importance  of  this  food  in  the 
body. 

So  that  this  disease,  which  was  long  believed  to 
illustrate  the  dangers  of  eating  sugar,  is,  in  reality, 
a  most  convincing  proof  of  its  importance  and 


60  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

necessity  as  a  food.  Instead  of  depriving  our  dia- 
betic patients  of  both  starch  and  sugar  completely, 
we  now  endeavour  to  increase  their  power  of  burning 
sugar,  or  by  short  "starch  fasts"  and  by  experi- 
mentation with  other  starches  than  wheat,  such 
as  oatmeal,  rice,  potatoes,  soy-bean  and  various 
preparations  of  curds.  Fortunately,  some  diabetics 
who  cannot  burn  more  than  very  small  amounts  of 
wheat  starch,  in  the  form  of  bread,  will  be  able  to 
burn  enough  starch  to  keep  up  their  strength,  in 
the  form  of  oatmeal  or  potatoes. 

All  of  which  clearly  proves  from  a  scientific  point 
of  view,  what  we  have  known  by  instinct  for  the  last 
three  million  years,  viz.,  that  sugar  is  a  full  member 
of  the  great  Dietetic  Trinity,  the  three  great  indis- 
pensable food  substances:  Meats,  Starch-sugars, 
Fats  (proteins,  carbohydrates,  hydrocarbons},  without 
which  no  animal  can  maintain  life  or  health.  If 
any  man  is  going  to  maintain  an  exclusive  diet  from 
which  any  one  of  these  three  food  foundation-stones 
is  to  be  omitted,  in  the  first  place  he  will  have  to  do 
it  on  laboratory  or  factory  products;  and  in  the 
second  place  he  will  have  to  eat  considerable  amounts 
of  his  tabooed  substance  without  knowing  it  —  or 
admitting  it  in  public  —  if  he  expects  to  continue 
on  this  mundane  sphere.  Perhaps  on  the  other  side 
of  Jordan  we  may  succeed  in  existing  upon  sugar- 
free,  meat-free,  grease-free,  purin-free,  or  salt-free 
dietary,  but  never  on  this. 


THE  SWEET  TOOTH  61 

Now,  what  is  all  this  sugar  doing  "in  that  gallery" 
of  the  muscle  cell?  All  sorts  of  curious  answers 
have  been  returned  to  this  question.  It  was  sup- 
posed to  be  a  sort  of  storage  product  —  the  liquid 
capital  of  the  body's  savings-bank,  like  fat,  or  like 
starch  in  the  vegetable.  It  was  even  put  down  as 
a  waste  product,  and  it  was  only  a  few  years  ago 
that  the  real  purpose  and  importance  of  its  presence 
was  discovered.  To  put  it  briefly  and  roughly,  it 
serves  as  the  fuel  for  the  muscle  engine.  Each  of 
those  tiny  explosions,  which  we  call  a  contraction, 
of  muscle,  burns  up  and  destroys  a  certain  amount 
of  sugar,  and  as  soon  as  the  free  sugar  in  the  muscle 
has  been  used  up,  then  that  muscle  is  as  incapable 
of  further  contraction  as  an  automobile  is  of  speed 
when  its  gasoline  tank  is  empty. 

Muscles  of  cold-blooded  animals,  like  the  heart 
of  a  tortoise,  for  instance,  can  be  completely  re- 
moved from  the  body  and  kept  beating  regularly, 
not  merely  for  days,  but  even  for  weeks,  as  long 
as  they  are  supplied  with  artificial  "blood"  to  pump 
through  themselves,  consisting  solely  of  a  solution 
of  certain  proportions  of  salts  and  grape-sugar. 
While  our  muscle-engines  can  burn  protein  and,  at 
a  pinch,  fat,  yet  it  is  pretty  certain  now  that  their 
chief  and  preferred  fuel  is  sugar  in  some  form.  The 
best  and  most  readily  absorbed  and  combustible 
sugar  is  that  contained,  as  we  have  seen,  in  meat, 
milk,  etc.  (proteins},  but  the  starch  of  grains  and  the 


62  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

sugar  of  fruits  is  a  pretty  close  second,  though  it  is 
doubtful  whether  these  alone  can  ever  completely 
meet  the  fuel  demands  of  the  organism.  Certainly 
every  known  animal  and  race  of  man  has  both  his 
vigour  and  his  disease-resisting  power  increased 
by  taking  part  of  his  sugar-fuel  in  animal  form. 

Practically,  man,  while  preferring  muscle  protein 
and  muscle  sugar  to  all  others,  has  always  been 
both  driven  by  necessity  and  led  by  instinct  to 
draw  a  large  share  of  both  his  protein  and  sugar- 
starch  fuel  from  the  vegetable  kingdom.  The 
greatest  advantage  of  these  vegetable  foods  is  their 
cheapness,  but  they  also  possess  certain  other  desir- 
able qualities,  such  as  forming  waste  products  which 
help  to  neutralize  those  produced  by  meat  and  which, 
being  thrown  off  by  the  lungs  in  the  form  of  carbon 
dioxid,  help  to  relieve  the  otherwise  heavy  burden  of 
excretion  thrown  upon  kidneys  and  skin.  Both 
the  bulk  and  the  majority  of  the  fuel  value  of  every 
known  human  diet  save  that  of  a  few  hunting  tribes, 
consists  of  starch  in  some  form  and  every  particle 
of  this  has  to  be  turned  into  sugar  before  it  can  be 
utilized  in  the  body. 

A  singular  feature  is  that  while  practically  every 
one  concedes  the  wholesomeness,  nay,  even  the  posi- 
tive virtue  of  starch,  there  is  a  strong  popular 
prejudice  against  its  twin  carbohydrate,  sugar. 
Sugar-eating  —  candy-gorging  —  is  denounced  with- 
out stint  both  by  mothers  in  Israel,  hard-headed 


THE  SWEET  TOOTH  63 

economists,  and  diet  reformers  of  all  classes.  It  is 
bewailed  as  the  dietetic  sin  of  the  century,  the  cause 
of  the  decay  of  modern  teeth,  of  the  alleged  decline 
of  modern  physique  and  vigour,  the  fertile  cause  of 
fermentations  and  putrefactions  in  the  stomach 
and  bowels,  the  shortener  of  life  and  precipitator 
of  old  age;  while  an  alarming  list  of  the  ills  of  twen- 
tieth-century humanity  such  as  diabetes,  gout, 
cancer,  and  nervous  diseases  are  laid  at  its  door.  In 
fact,  in  certain  circles  it  is  berated  almost  as  vehe- 
mently as  a  fons  et  origo  mali  as  its  second  cousin, 
alcohol,  is  in  others.  This  eager  thirst  for  single 
and  simple  causes  of  multiple  and  complex  evils 
is  one  of  the  pet  obsessions  of  human  thought.  It 
invented  the  devil  in  primitive  times,  and  the  drink 
demon,  the  cigarette  fiend,  the  meat  lust,  and  the 
sugar  habit  of  our  own  day.  While  our  denuncia- 
tions of  all  these  evils  have  unquestionably  a 
certain  amount  of  rational  basis  in  fact,  they  have 
been  and  still  are  carried  to  absurd  and  injurious 
extremes. 

The  very  authorities  who  are  most  vehement 
against  sugar  are  at  the  same  time,  like  most  diet 
reformers  of  to-day,  ardent  and  devoted  worshippers 
of  starch,  every  particle  of  which  has  to  be  turned 
into  sugar  before  it  can  be  utilized  by  the  body  — 
not  cane  sugar  or  beet  sugar,  it  is  true  —  but  one 
equally  subject  to  fermentations  of  all  sorts  and 
even  more  capable  of  giving  rise  to  diabetes,  pre- 


64  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

mature  old  age,  and  the  whole  train  of  evils  laid  at 
its  door. 

The  principal  causes  of  this  distrust  and  denun- 
ciation of  sugar  seem  to  be:  First,  because  children 
cry  for  it;  second,  it  is  attractive  to  the  natural 
appetite  and  may  be  indulged  in  to  excess,  and  is 
therefore  wholly  bad;  the  familiar  argument  of  the 
monk  and  the  ascetic  of  all  ages  against  the  "lusts 
of  the  flesh,"  including  the  family  affections  and 
half  the  virtues;  third,  because  it  is  new,  and  therefore 
to  be  viewed  with  alarm  and  suspicion,  and  promptly 
accused  as  the  cause  of  any  new  or  newly  discovered 
disease  which  cannot  otherwise  be  accounted  for. 

The  first  objection  fortunately  needs  little  at- 
tention nowadays.  Powerful  as  it  may  have  been 
in  starting  the  prejudice  against  sugar,  we  recog- 
nized, years  ago,  that  instinct,  craving,  an  untaught 
preference  for  a  particular  thing  or  action  always 
means  something;  indeed,  we  might  almost  say  in 
Browning's  phrase,  that  it  "means  intensely  and 
means  good,"  in  nine  cases  out  of  ten.  It  is  the 
crystallized  result  of  the  experience  of  thousands  of 
generations,  and  while,  like  all  other  impulses,  it 
must  take  its  place  in  the  parliament  of  instincts 
and  submit  to  the  rules  of  order  of  reason,  in  the 
main  it  is  a  safe  and  invaluable  guide.  The  young, 
unspoiled  human  animal  has  a  liking  for  sugar  just 
as  it  has  for  sunlight,  for  fresh  air,  for  play,  for  pad- 
dling in  the  surf  and  plunging  in  the  stream,  or 


THE  SWEET  TOOTH  65 

for  food  when  it  is  hungry  and  sleep  when  it  is  tired; 
and,  subject  of  course  to  reasonable  limitations,  as 
wholesome  as  any  of  the  others.  This  is  precisely 
what  our  specialists  in  children's  diseases,  and  broad- 
minded  family  physicians  have  been  urging  for 
decades  past,  and  it  would  be  safe  to  say  that  next 
to  the  banishment  of  starchy  foods,  gruels,  and  paps 
from  the  nursery  and  the  substitution  of  pure,  sweet 
milk,  few  things  have  done  more  to  increase  the  vigour 
and  happiness  of  modern  children  and  to  cut  down 
our  disgraceful  infant  mortality,  than  the  free  and 
intelligent  use  of  sweet  fruits,  preserves,  sugar, 
taffy,  and  butter-scotch  in  the  nursery. 

One  of  the  earliest  additions  that  is  now  made  to 
the  exclusive  milk  diet  of  a  six-months-old  baby 
is  the  pulp  of  a  baked  apple,  or  the  juice  of  stewed 
prunes,  while  sw^eet  apple  sauce,  sweet  oranges, 
bananas,  and  ripe  fruits  in  their  seasons  are  a  regular 
and  important  part  of  all  modern  dietaries  for  young 
children.  Nearly  twenty  years  ago  one  physician- 
philosopher  declared  that  if  we  would  give  children 
plenty  of  butter-scotch  and  taffy,  they  would  need 
little  cod-liver  oil.  And  his  prophecy  has  well-nigh 
been  fulfilled  already,  for  this  "pampering"  of  the 
natural  appetite  of  the  child  for  sweet  fruit,  sugar, 
and  candy,  has  resulted  in  very  nearly  banishing 
to  the  limbo  of  fecal  medicine  where  it  really  be- 
longed, that  nauseous  relic  of  barbarism,  cod-liver 
oil  and  its  twin  sisters,  rhubarb,  quassia,  gentian, 


66  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

and  other  bitters,  whose  principal  virtue  was  their 
abominable  taste.  The  diet  of  children  has  been 
far  too  much  formulated  in  the  past  upon  the  simple 
and  intelligence-saving  principle  of  urging  or  even 
compelling  them  to  eat  that  which  they  did  not  want, 
and  depriving  them  of  most  things  they  did  want. 

The  regulation  of  their  physical  food  was,  like 
that  of  their  mental  pabulum  in  formal  education, 
conceived  too  much  in  the  spirit  of  the  nursemaid 
who,  missing  two  of  her  young  charges,  sent  another 
one  in  search  of  them  with  orders  to  "find  Miss 
Flossy  and  Master  Ralph,  see  what  they  were 
doin',  and  tell  them  they  mustn't ! "  But  fortunately 
we  are  outgrowing  that  sort  of  thing,  and  when  we 
have  completely  done  so,  fully  half  of  the  prejudice 
against  sugar  will  have  disappeared. 

As  to  the  second  objection  to  sugar:  that  it  is  so 
attractive  as  to  be  easily  indulged  in  to  excess,  it  is 
merely  necessary  to  remind  ourselves  in  the  quaint 
phrase  of  old  Ben  Jonson: 

But  sweetest  things  turn  sourest  in  their  deeds, 
Lilies  that  fester,  smell  far  worse  than  weeds  — 

and  that  the  more  powerful  a  thing  is  for  good,  the 
more  potent  it  may  be  for  evil  if  carried  to  an  ex- 
treme. It  is  certainly  one  of  the  chief  ethical  ad- 
vantages of  the  starches  that  nobody  but  a  cow  or  a 
rabbit  would  be  tempted  to  indulge  in  them  to  excess; 
but  to  cut  out  of  our  dietary  or  even  discourage  the 
use  of  all  substances  which  are  highly  appetizing 


THE  SWEET  TOOTH  67 

and  seductively  attractive,  is  simply  a  form  of  slow 
suicide.  Yet  this  is  the  keynote  and  fundamental 
principle  of  the  crusade  of  our  diet  reformers  against 
meats  and  sugars.  The  practical  result  of  cutting 
out  or  limiting  the  sugars  and  meats  in  our  diet  is 
to  diminish  its  total  amount,  and  such  temporary  or 
imaginary  benefits  as  may  follow  are  the  results  of 
a  polite  form  of  mild  starvation. 

Children  may  eat  too  much  sugar  and  they  may 
also  stay  too  long  in  their  bath  tub,  or  in  the  creek 
when  they  go  in  swimming,  or  get  tanned  or  a  head- 
ache from  playing  too  long  in  the  sun,  or  chilled  by 
staying  too  long  in  the  open  air;  but  is  that  any 
sound  reason  why  they  should  be  deprived  of  sweets, 
sunlight,  baths,  and  fresh  air,  or  discouraged  from 
indulging  in  them?  All  that  is  needed  is  a  little 
common  sense  regulation  and  judicious  supervision, 
not  prohibition,  or  denunciation.  Most  of  the 
extraordinary  craving  for  pure  sugar  and  candy, 
which  is  supposed  to  lead  the  average  child  to  inevi- 
tably "founder  himself"  if  left  to  his  own  sweet  will 
and  a  box  of  candy,  is  due  to  a  state  of  artificial 
and  abnormal  sugar  starvation,  produced  by  an 
insufficient  amount  of  this  invaluable  food  in  its 
regular  diet.  Children  who  are  given  plenty  of 
sugar  on  their  mush,  bread  and  butter,  and  puddings, 
a  regular  allowance  of  cake  and  plenty  of  sweet 
fruits,  are  almost  free  from  this  craze  for  candy,  this 
tendency  to  gorge  themselves  to  surfeit,  and  can 


S8  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

usually  be  trusted  with  both  the  candy  box  and  the 
sugar  bowl. 

The  last  ground  of  prejudice  against  sugar,  that  of 
its  newness,  is  interesting  from  several  points  of  view. 
There  is  no  more  favourite  and  irrepressible  delusion 
of  the  human  mind  than  that  this  particular  age 
in  which  we  live  is  a  degenerate  one  and  that  the 
rising  generation  is  an  especially  striking  example  of 
that  fact.  Every  time  that  a  new  disease  is  dis- 
covered —  discovered  just  as  America  was  by 
Columbus,  it  was  there  all  the  time  only  we  had  not 
the  sense  to  recognize  it  —  every  old  wiseacre  lifts 
up  his  voice  to  the  effect  that:  "We  never  had 
nawthin'  like  that  when  I  was  a  boy."  And  since 
for  a  new  phenomenon  a  new  cause  must  be  dis- 
covered, he  usually  proceeds  to  promptly  accuse  one 
of  "these  here  new-fangled  foods." 

Thus,  our  modern  abundance  of  fruit  and  preserves 
is  confidently  brought  forward  as  the  cause  of 
appendicitis.  Tomatoes  are  gravely  accused  of 
being  the  cause  of  cancer,  the  cigarette  of  every 
variety  of  youthful  depravity;  and  sugar  as  the 
fruitful  mother  of  a  whole  brood  of  diseases  and  de- 
generacies. The  process  has  been  going  on  ever 
since  the  ark  landed  on  Ararat  and  has  not  a  par- 
ticle more  basis  in  fact  or  solid  common  sense,  than 
it  had  when  it  began.  Incidentally,  as  a  matter  of 
fact,  sugar  is  not  a  cause  of  modern  degeneracy  or 
shorter  life,  or  increasing  "onhelthyness,"  for  the 


THE  SWEET  TOOTH  69 

simple  but  sufficient  reason  that  the  present  gener- 
ation is  taller,  healthier,  and  longer-lived  than  any 
that  has  ever  preceded  it.  Its  abundance  and 
cheapness  is  one  of  the  causes  of  our  improved  and 
improving  modern  physique. 

However  there  is  just  this  trifle  more  actual  basis 
for  dread  of  a  possible  excessive  indulgence  in  sugar 
in  these  modern  days,  on  this  ground.  That  is,  that 
whereas  formerly  sugar  could  only  be  secured  in  a 
very  dilute  form  as  a  flavouring  element  in  milk, 
fruits,  grains,  and  the  juices  of  certain  plants,  it 
can  now  be  obtained  both  cheaply  and  abundantly 
in  pure  concentrated  form.  In  a  rough  way,  the 
sugar  refinery  and  the  growth  of  the  cane  and  beet- 
root industry  have  done  for  sugar  what  the  still 
has  for  alcohol  —  concentrated  it  and  thus  rendered 
over-indulgence  more  easy.  Sugar,  unquestionably, 
is  a  surprisingly  modern  luxury,  and  it  is  hard  for  us 
to  realize  sometimes  that,  up  to  about  one  hundred 
and  fifty  years  ago,  almost  the  only  concentrated  or 
pure  form  of  sugar  available  was  honey  or  dried 
tropical  fruits,  like  figs  and  dates  or,  in  certain  dis- 
tricts, maple  sugar.  It  was,  emphatically,  a  rare 
and  expensive  luxury  —  in  the  days  of  King  John 
"six  lumps  of  sugar"  were  recorded  as  a  royal  present 
—  and  it  is  quite  possible  that  an  appetite  for  it 
whetted  to  the  keenest  possible  edge  by  such  rarity, 
might,  if  not  watched  and  moderated,  lead  to  excess. 

But  there  is  this  fundamental  difference  between 


70  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

the  craving  for  sugar  and  that  for  "sours,"  acids, 
vinegar,  pickles,  etc.,  alcohol,  and  for  other  keen 
flavours  and  highly  attractive  luxuries,  that  it  is  a 
real  food  of  very  high  food-value  and  very  promptly 
and  readily  absorbable,  which  none  of  the  others  are, 
except  in  small  degree.  As  we  have  seen,  this 
violent  craving  for  sugar,  leading  to  excess,  largely 
disappears  in  children  when  their  healthy  demand  for 
it  is  supplied  by  a  proper  mixture  with  their  foods; 
while  no  child  yet  has  ever  inherited  or  been  born 
with  a  taste  for  alcohol,  pickles,  tea,  coffee  or  tobacco. 
One  of  the  greatest  values  of  sugar,  apart  from  its 
high-steaming  power,  is  the  rapidity  with  which  it 
can  be  absorbed  and  burned  in  the  body  engine. 
The  careful  and  exhaustive  researches  of  Lee, 
Mosso,  Harley,  and  Schomburg  showed  that  there 
was  no  food  which  would  restore  working  power  to 
fatigued  muscles  of  both  men  and  animals,  so 
quickly  and  effectively  as  pure  sugar.  Indeed  it  was 
suggested  by  Professor  Lee  that  tired  business  men, 
carried  beyond  their  regular  lunch  hour,  would  find 
a  few  lumps  of  pure  sugar  one  of  the  best  of  tempor- 
ary restoratives  and  "pick-me-ups,"  far  superior  to 
alcohol.  This  is  probably  the  reason  why  some 
individuals  when  fatigued  will  retain  an  appetite 
for  sweet  things  though  they  have  almost  completely 
lost  it  for  anything  else. 

Indeed,  the  role  and  importance  of  sugar  as  a 
rapid  reliever  of  fatigue  is  one  which  we  are  only 


THE  SWEET  TOOTH  71 

just  beginning  to  appreciate,  and  which  goes  sur- 
prisingly far  already.  It  has  been  incorporated  into 
the  most  hardheaded,  cold-blooded,  matter-of-fact 
diet  on  earth,  the  German  army  rations,  especially 
the  "forced-march"  emergency  ration.  No  other 
food  of  its  bulk  can  take  its  place.  It  is  the  belief 
of  careful  observers  of  men,  particularly  in  the 
tropics,  that  the  larger  the  amount  of  sugar,  and 
sugar-containing  foods  they  are  supplied  with, 
the  less  alcohol  and  other  stimulants  they  will  crave. 
For  instance,  the  United  States  Government  now 
buys  the  best  and  purest  of  candy  by  the  ton, 
and  ships  it  to  the  Philippines,  to  be  supplied  to 
the  canteens  and  messes,  finding  that  its  use  dimin- 
ishes the  craving  for  native  brandy;  and  it  has  long 
been  a  matter  of  comment  from  thoughtful  ob- 
servers that  the  amount  of  drunkenness  of  a  race 
or  class  is  in  inverse  ratio  to  the  amount  of  sugar  it 
consumes. 

There  is  less  drunkenness  in  America  than  in  any 
North  European  country,  and  the  first  thing  that 
strikes  a  European  of  intelligence  on  landing  in  this 
country  is  the  extraordinary  abundance  and  mul- 
tiplicity of  candy  stores,  ice-cream  parlors,  and 
venders  of  sweets,  fruits,  and  "hokey-pokey."  In 
Germany,  for  instance,  it  is  considered  unmanly  to 
confess  to  a  taste  for  sweets.  It  seems  not  impossible 
that  the  well-known  anthropologic  fact  that  drunk- 
enness is  a  function  of  temperature,  that  only  the 


72  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

Northern  races,  roughly  speaking,  are  drinkers  to 
excess,  while  the  Southern  races  are  comparatively 
temperate,  may  be  connected  with  the  fact  that  the 
South  and  the  sub-tropics  are  the  home  of  abundant 
fruits  and  vegetables  rich  in  sugar,  such  as  grapes, 
figs,  dates,  bananas,  yams,  sugar  cane,  etc.  Fruits 
and  nuts,  until  within  the  last  fifteen  or  twenty  years, 
scarcely  entered  into  the  regular  diet  of  the  working 
and  lower  middle  classes  of  Northern  Europe,  save 
for  a  few  weeks  in  summer,  while  they  have  always 
formed  an  important  staple  the  year  round  upon 
the  tables  of  the  Italians,  the  Spaniards,  and  the 
Greeks.  It  is  not  unlikely  that  the  almost  universal 
and  devoutly  to  be  thankful  for  lack  of  craving  for 
alcohol  in  children  and  in  women  is  due  largely  to 
the  sweet  tooth  possessed  by  them  and  their  indul- 
gence in  candy,  cakes,  fruit,  ice-cream,  and  sweet- 
meats generally.  Certain  it  is  that  our  most  care- 
ful students  of  social  problems  are  coming  to  the 
opinion  that  an  abundant  and  well-cooked  dietary, 
with  plenty  of  variety  in  it,  especially  in  the  form  of 
fruits,  sugars,  cakes,  and  creams  is,  combined  with 
plenty  of  wholesome  recreation  and  sensible  amuse- 
ment, the  best  antidote  known  for  the  alcohol  habit 
—  indeed,  together,  they  are  steadily  undermining 
it  all  over  the  land.  In  fine,  a  taste  for  sweets,  while 
it  should  be  indulged  like  everything  else,  in  reason 
and  moderation,  instead  of  being  repressed,  should 
be  cultivated,  indulged,  and  broadened,  as  one  of 


THE  SWEET  TOOTH  73 

our  most  valuable  tendencies,  not  only  on  hygienic 
but  also  on  moral  grounds. 

More  than  fifty  years  ago  it  was  declared  by  the 
warden  of  Millbank,  one  of  England's  great  convict 
reformatories,  that  he  had  always  hope  of  the  refor- 
mation of  a  criminal,  no  matter  how  violent  or 
apparently  depraved,  so  long  as  he  retained  an 
appetite  for  apple  pie! 

The  days  of  innocence  and  the  sweet  tooth  seem 
closely  linked  together. 


CHAPTER  V 

THE    KINDERGARTEN    AGE 

THE  first  danger-signal  in  the  kindergarten 
age  is  the  kindergarten  itself.  The  keynote 
of  the  nursery  stage  of  man  is  food,  sun- 
shine, and  rest.  The  keynote  of  the  kindergarten 
stage  is  food,  open  air,  and  exercise.  The  schoolroom 
supplies  none  of  these;  hence  it  is,  at  this  stage,  a 
superfluity  a  hindrance  to  growth,  both  physical  and 
mental.  There  is  nothing  done  in  the  kindergarten 
which  could  not  be  far  better  done  in  the  playground 
or  a  real  garden;  nothing  taught  but  what  healthy 
children  would  teach  themselves,  under  intelligent 
supervision  and  guidance.  Moreover,  the  kinder- 
garten violates  nature's  most  insistent  rule  —  that 
the  growing  child  shall  be  able  to  give  a  valid 
excuse  for  every  hour  spent  indoors.  Even  its  sleep 
is  better  taken  as  nearly  as  possible  in  the  open  air. 
Indoor  work  of  any  sort,  and  particularly  that  which 
is  done  sitting  down,  traverses  absolutely  the  natural 
order  of  growth  and  development  of  the  child.  What 
he  needs  and  is  most  interested  in  is  large,  full, 
sweeping  movements,  involving  the  whole  arm,  or 
both  limbs,  or  all  of  these  together  and  the  body  as 

74 


THE  KINDERGARTEN  AGE  75 

well,  instead  of  little,  precise,  carefully  guided, 
toy-mouse  kinds  of  movements  with  the  hand  and 
fingers  alone.  Accuracy,  precision,  precise  propor- 
tion, he  is  absolutely  incapable  of  now  and  should 
not  even  be  allowed  to  attempt.  Nothing  could  be 
much  worse  for  an  active,  sturdy,  growing  child, 
who  wants  to  run  and  tumble,  wave  his  arms  about 
and  kick  his  legs  in  the  air  and  shout,  than  to  be 
planted  in  a  footsy  little  chair  at  a  doll's-house 
table,  pricking  tiny  holes  in  a  sweet  little  piece 
of  perforated  cardboard.  It  were  better  for  him  to 
be  out  in  the  street  learning  to  fight  and  crawl 
through  sewer-pipes. 

A  child's  eyes  and  crystalline  lens  and  eye-muscles 
are  all,  at  this  age,  adapted  to  what  his  interests 
call  for,  viz.,  looking  at  large,  swiftly  moving,  readily 
visible  objects,  preferably  at  a  distance  of  eight  or 
ten  feet,  or  more.  He,  in  one  sense,  is  born  old,  in 
that  he  is  born  slightly  far-sighted;  and  to  compel 
him  to  concentrate  his  attenion,for  hours  at  a  stretch, 
upon  small,  intricate  objects  at  close  range  is  to 
throw  upon  his  elastic  and  readily  mouldable  eye- 
balls a  strain  for  which  they  are  utterly  unfitted  and 
which  is  exceedingly  likely  to  result  in  compressing 
them  out  of  shape,  causing  them  to  elongate  and  to 
become  myopic,  or  short-sighted.  Close  work,  after 
ten  or  twelve  years  of  age,  while  it  may  seriously 
fatigue  the  muscles  of  the  eyes,  can  do  little  to  change 
its  shape;  but  between  four  and  seven  there  is  no 


76  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

question  of  the  serious  damage  which  may  be  done 
by  aggravating  any  short-sightedness  with  which 
the  child  was  born,  or  producing  it  in  those  who  would 
otherwise  have  escaped  it.  Examinations  of  the 
eyes  of  thousands  of  young  children  in  all  parts  of 
the  world  —  savage,  barbarian,  and  civilized  — 
have  shown  that  they  all  practically  start  in  life 
with  the  same  shape  of  eye,  viz.,  a  slightly  flattened 
or  long-sighted  one,  and  that  the  percentage  of  those 
who  develop  myopia,  or  short  sight,  is  in  precise 
relation  to  the  -earliness  with  which  they  are  put  into 
school  and  the  constancy  and  length  of  their  con- 
finement in  the  schoolroom. 

Moral:  Don't  worry  about  the  school  you  are 
going  to  send  your  baby  to.  Keep  him  out  of  any 
sort  as  long  as  your  conscience  will  let  you  —  and 
then  a  year  longer.  This  is  perfectly  good  and  safe 
advice.  A  child's  proper  business  is  to  grow,  and  to 
exercise  his  powers  as  fast  as  he  gets  them.  This 
gives  him  an  enormous  appetite,  which  causes  more 
growth  and  again  calls  for  more  exercise  of  new- 
found powers.  In  so  far  as  school  is  carried  out 
within  four  walls,  it  does  nothing  to  help  this  progress 
and  much  to  hinder  it.  It  may  be  tolerated,  but 
on  sufferance  only,  and  the  rule  at  this  stage  should 
be  to  reduce  it  to  a  minimum.  Nine  tenths  of  the 
growth  that  the  modern  child  under  ten  makes, 
whether  physical  or  mental,  he  makes  in  spite  of 
school,  not  on  account  of  it. 


THE  KINDERGARTEN  AGE  77 

There  is  no  need  whatever  for  conflict  between 
education  and  growth;  indeed,  all  the  most  intelli- 
gent and  progressive  teachers,  from  kindergarten 
to  high  school,  are  at  one  with  the  doctor  and  the 
sanitarium  and  anxious  to  harmonize  them.  All 
the  rational  aims  of  school  can  be  attained  with  far 
less  friction  and  labour  for  both  teachers  and  pupils 
by  methods  much  less  inimical  to  the  child's  health. 
If  school  hours  were  cut  down  to  two  hours  a  day, 
and  the  time  saved  devoted  to  intelligently  super- 
vised natural  play,  gardening,  carpentering,  etc., 
in  the  open  air,  children  would  make  just  as  rapid 
progress  in  their  studies,  even  under  our  present 
antiquated  curriculum  as  they  do  now. 

Purely  from  the  point  of  view  of  vital  economics, 
I  know  of  few  institutions  more  wasteful  of  the  time, 
the  health,  and  the  temper  of  both  children  and 
teachers  than  our  present  school  system.  True, 
it  doesn't  do  much  harm,  because  the  young  human 
animal  is  most  providentially  tough,  and  will  continue 
to  grow  and  develop  such  powers  as  he  was  born 
with,  both  physical  and  mental,  no  matter  what  is 
done  to  him,  so  long  as  he  is  well  fed,  gets  plenty  of 
sleep,  and  is  given  a  chance  to  get  into  the  open  air 
a  few  hours  each  day. 

The  hygienic  conditions  of  the  schoolroom  may 
be  better  than  the  homes  of  its  children,  but  they 
are  always  worse  than  those  of  their  play  places, 
which  they  would  live  in  if  released;  and  five  hours' 


78  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

daily  confinement  at  hard  labour  is  hygienically  an 
exceedingly  poor  substitute  for  a  day  in  nature's 
great  school  —  all  outdoors ! 

Still  abideth  the  trinity  of  growth  —  food,  air, 
exercise;  these  three,  and  the  greatest  of  these  is 
food.  Our  little  human  locomotive  must  have 
fuel  first,  fuel  last,  fuel  all  the  time.  Not  merely 
what  he  needs  to  keep  him  running  twenty-four 
hours  out  of  the  twenty-four,  for  he  is  the  embodied 
secret  of  perpetual  motion,  but  enough  to  enable 
him  to  grow  from  a  tiny  donkey-engine  into  a  great 
six-foot-wheeled,  mountain-climbing  mogul.  Also 
incidentally  remember  that  his  running  gear  and 
cylinders  and  driving-wheels  are  not  made  of  starch, 
and  he  cannot  build  them  out  of  mushes  and  pud- 
dings and  potatoes,  any  more  than  he  can  make 
bricks  without  straw. 


CHAPTER  VI 

FEEDING    THE    HUMAN    CATERPILLAR 

EVER  since  the  day  of  the  Seven  Ages  of  Man 
we  have  known  that  a  man  passes  through  a 
series  of  distinct  and  different  stages  in 
the  course  of  his  life.  But  we  do  not  so  clearly  real- 
ize that  he  is  also  a  different  creature,  often  widely 
so,  in  each  one  of  those  stages.  The  child  is  not 
"father  of  the  man,"  as  the  absurd  old  proverb 
declares,  but  his  "grub,"  or  in  technical  language, 
his  larval  stage  and  as  different  from  him  in  many 
respects  as  a  caterpillar  is  from  a  butterfly.  The 
baby  not  only  crawls,  but  eats  enormously,  de- 
vouring nearly  four  times  as  much  in  proportion  to 
his  body  weight  as  a  grown-up  does.  The  child 
rises  above  the  crawling  part  of  the  caterpillar 
stage,  but  still  retains  the  appetite.  He  literally 
lives  to  eat,  devouring  things  like  an  army  worm 
and  is  never  happy  —  or  healthy  —  when  awake, 
unless  devouring,  or  digesting  something. 

The  appetite  of  a  healthy  child  of  the  kinder- 
garten age  is  something  appalling.  He  is  a  walking 
famine,  a  hunger  incarnate.  All  is  grist  that  comes 
to  his  mill,  and  all  hours  of  the  day  or  night  are 

79 


8o  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

alike  to  him.  But  he  needs  every  ounce  that  he 
will  devour,  and  not  one  penny's  worth  of  it  will  be 
wasted.  Don't  bother  about  the  child.  Just  be 
sure  that  his  food  is  right,  pure,  sound,  and  of  the 
best  quality,  then  let  him  go  ahead !  His  wisdom  is 
of  the  ages;  yours  where  it  clashes  with  his,  is  of 
the  almanacs,  of  the  catechisms  and  copybooks,  of 
the  silly  chatter  of  the  street  and  the  kitchen.  If 
children  were  not  born  hungry  and  continued  so  as 
long  as  they  were  growing,  they  would  never  grow 
up;  for,  even  with  the  utmost  liberality  and  kindest 
intentions  on  the  part  of  us  parents,  we  never  can 
quite  retain  a  realizing  sense,  a  living  memory,  of 
the  actual  kind  of  appetite  we  had  when  we  were 
boys,  and  how  we  absolutely  suffered  to  eat!  "The 
boy  gets  three  square  meals  a  day,  just  as  I  do, 
and  eats  almost  as  much!"  we  exclaim.  "What 
more  can  he  want?"  Three  square  meals  a  day 
for  a  healthy  boy  are  just  the  mere  foundation  of  his 
day's  eating. 

Eating  is  a  serious  and  conscientious  business 
with  him.  He  devotes  a  considerable  share  of  his 
mind  to  it.  And  he  is  eternally  and  fundamentally 
right  about  it,  as  both  biology  and  physiology  have 
shown  us.  Yet  up  to  a  decade  or  two  ago  the  most 
highly  approved  and  frequently  harped-upon  theme 
in  the  petty  morality  of  the  nursery  and  the  Sunday 
school  -was  the  greediness  of  naughty  little  boys  and 
girls  and  its  Terrible  Consequences,  from  whippings 


FEEDING  THE  HUMAN  CATERPILLAR    81 

to  colics  and  sudden  death.  Had  we  known  of 
appendicitis  then  it  would  have  been  included  as 
one  of  the  bogies. 

Upon  what  physiologic  or  rational  basis  the  great, 
sacred  dietetic  principle  of  Three  Square  Meals  a 
Day  and  No  Eating  Between  Meals  was  founded  is 
difficult  of  discovery,  even  for  adults,  and  impos- 
sible for  children.  It  certainly  has  no  basis  in  the 
broad  field  of  animal  habits  and  experiments.  Most 
animals  in  a  state  of  nature  eat  whenever  they  can 
get  food  and  until  they  can  hold  no  more.  Cows 
and  horses,  for  instance,  at  pasture,  graze  steadily 
from  half  to  two  thirds  of  the  day  or  in  summer 
time,  night.  These  scarcely  come  within  the  direct 
line  of  our  ancestry,  even  on  Darwinian  principles, 
but  I  can't  help  thinking  that  traces  of  their  char- 
acters occasionally  appear  in  our  children.  So 
that,  ancestrally,  the  healthy  human  stomach 
ought  to  be  able  to  take  care  of  any  article  of  food 
in  reason,  in  any  amount  within  the  cubic  capacity 
of  its  walls,  at  any  hour  of  the  day  or  night.  Thou- 
sands of  experiments  have  shown  that  it  has  pre- 
cisely the  powers  that  might  have  been  expected  of 
it,  on  ancestral  grounds. 

The  notion  that  the  stomach  requires  a  certain 
definite  interval  of  rest  between  tasks  in  order  to  get 
up  its  supply  of  gastric  juice  has  been  completely 
exploded,  inasmuch  as  it  has  been  found  that  the 
resting  and  empty  stomach  contains  no  gastric 


82  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

juice  whatever;  and  it  secretes  none  until  food  is 
actually  put  into  it  or  smelled.  In  other  words, 
it  makes  its  gastric  juice  during  the  process  of 
digestion  just  as  it  is  needed,  and,  in  all  probability, 
out  of  the  very  food  which  it  is  digesting.  The  best, 
indeed  the  only,  way  to  make  the  stomach  secrete 
is  to  feed  it,  not  rest  it! 

The  principal  sanction  of  the  three-meals-a-day 
plan  for  adults  is  based  upon  convenience,  taking 
as  the  distance  between  the  longest  period  for  which 
experience  has  shown  the  human  stomach  can  be 
"loaded"  comfortably  without  undue  distention, 
and  then  spacing  these  times  of  loading  at  such 
hours  as  will  least  interfere  with  both  the  work  and 
the  business  of  the  men,  and  the  preparative  labour 
of  the  women  of  the  household.  Meals  in  fact,  are 
placed  on  an  average,  about  five  hours  apart  simply 
because  this  is  the  average  run  which  the  human 
locomotive  can  make  before  it  needs  to  be  coaled 
again.  Not  because  our  Sacred  Stomach  and 
Much-worshipped  Digestion  require  a  fixed  and 
stated  interval  of  rest  between  activities.  If  any 
one  feels  hungry  between  meals,  let  him  eat  by  all 
means,  providing  that  he  eats  that  which  is  nutri- 
tious and  reasonably  digestible.  It  is  a  sure  sign 
that  he  either  ate  too  little  at  his  last  meal,  or  has 
worked  too  much,  or  in  the  case  of  the  child,  grown 
too  much,  since.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  the  best  fed 
and  best  nourished  classes  and  peoples  eat  at  least 


FEEDING  THE  HUMAN  CATERPILLAR    83 

four,  and  often  five  meals  a  day  instead  of  the  sacred 
three. 

Therefore,  let  whoever  has  charge  of  the  feeding 
of  the  growing  child  of  the  kindergarten  age,  de- 
liberately plan  and  supply  him  with  appropriate, 
appetizing  and  nutritious  food  materials  suitable 
for  "piecing"  between  meals,  viz.,  sandwiches,  milk, 
cookies,  bread  and  butter,  or  rather  butter  and  bread, 
bread  and  cheese,  crackers,  particularly  sweet  ones, 
nuts,  fruit,  candy.  The  size  of  a  child's  stomach  is 
limited,  and  it  simply  cannot  be  filled  full  enough  of 
ordinary  food  to  carry  him  safely  and  comfortably 
over  more  than  four  or  five  hours.  It  is  a  good 
thing  to  have  three  or  more  regular  meals,  because 
it  has  been  found,  particularly  in  the  feeding  of 
babies  that,  whimsical  as  it  may  sound,  a  child's 
stomach  must  be  stretched  at  intervals  if  it  is  to 
grow  properly.  It  does  not  serve  to  administer  the 
precise  number  of  calories  required  in  small  doses 
two  hours  apart.  The  best  results  are  obtained 
by  three  good,  satisfying  square  meals  a  day,  where 
he  stays  at  the  table  until  he  drops  off  of  his  own 
accord,  with  one  liberal  piecing,  or  impromptu 
lunch  in  the  middle  of  the  morning,  another  in  the 
middle  of  the  afternoon  and  another,  if  desired  at 
bedtime.  This,  by  the  way,  is  the  regimen  by  which 
we  cure  consumption  nowadays,  and  what  will  cure 
a  sick  man  is  scarcely  likely  to  be  fatal  to  a  healthy 
one! 


84  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

The  child  is  consumed  by  the  fever  of  growth  as 
actively  as  the  consumptive  is  by  his  hectic.  When 
this  rule  is  adopted,  it  will  stop  at  once  most  of  the 
abnormal  cravings  and  gorgings  and  cramming 
themselves  with  all  sorts  of  indigestible,  unripe 
and  unwholesome  materials  on  the  part  of  children. 
A  healthy  child  would  rather  eat  sound,  whole- 
some, clean  food.  It  is  only  when  he  cannot  get  it 
in  sufficient  amounts,  or  often  enough,  that  he  eats 
grass  and  green  twigs  and  shoots  and  green  apples 
and  groundnuts,  and  "lickerish"  and  raw  turnips, 
or  carrots,  or  gorges  himself  to  excess  upon  candy, 
or  nuts,  or  cookies.  When  children  are  properly 
and  adequately  fed,  they  can  be  trusted  with  the 
candy  box,  the  open  fruit-basket  and  the  nut  bag, 
to  say  nothing  of  the  key  to  the  jam  closet,  or  the 
pantry. 

Here  is  a  rational  and  physiologic  day's  march 
through  this  stage  of  his  life's  journey  for  a  healthy 
growing  boy  or  girl,  of  from  five  to  seven  years  of 
age: 

Eight  a.m.,  breakfast,  consisting  chiefly  of  milk, 
eggs,  bacon,  ham,  fish,  mutton  chops,  with  butter, 
bread,  toast,  griddle  cakes,  cereals,  or  cookies  and 
fruit  or  preserves;  and  if  a  hot  drink  be  desired,  weak 
cocoa.  (For  details  see  menus.)  Starches  of  ali 
sorts,  except  bread  should  be  used  only  as  a  supple- 
ment to,  or  "filler"  with  milk,  eggs,  meat  or  fish, 
or  if  taken  alone  should  have  plenty  of  sugar  and 


FEEDING  THE  HUMAN  CATERPILLAR    85 

cream  on  them.  The  sugar  and  cream  for  instance, 
eaten  with  a  dish  of  cereal  form  the  most  valuable 
part  of  the  dish.  Eight-thirty  to  ten-thirty,  play 
in  the  open  air,  or  if  the  ground  be  wet  underfoot, 
or  the  weather  too  inclement,  in  a  shed,  barn  or 
gymnasium.  Ten-thirty,  lunch,  consisting  of  bread 
and  milk,  sandwiches,  ham,  beef,  cheese  or  egg,  cook- 
ies, cake,  bread  and  jam,  bread  and  "lasses,"  nuts 
particularly  roasted  or  salted,  and  fruit.  Eleven 
to  twelve-thirty,  more  play  in  the  open  air  including 
half  or  three  quarters  of  an  hour's  light  "lessons," 
in  a  well  ventilated  room,  or  outdoors  if  the  weather 
permits.  Twelve-thirty,  dinner,  consisting  of  meat, 
particularly  beef,  mutton,  or  pork,  potatoes  with  one 
or  more  vegetables,  especially  tomatoes,  peas,  let- 
tuce, celery  and  onions,  with  plenty  of  dessert  con- 
sisting of  sweet  puddings,  pie  (omitting  the  bottom 
crust),  cake,  honey  preserves,  or  fresh  fruit.  If 
soup  is  given,  it  should  never  exceed  more  than  a 
few  tablespoonfuls  in  amount,  as  it  has  absolutely 
no  nutritive  value  whatever  and  is  useful  only  as  an 
appetizer,  and  Introduction  Committee  to  the  real 
foods  of  the  meal.  There  is  ground  for  the  belief 
that  the  stomach  is  stimulated  by  soups  and  meat 
extracts,  to  secrete  the  gastric  juice,  if  indeed  it 
does  not  actually  use  them  in  the  process  of  making 
that  juice. 

If  the  child  has  been  playing  in  the  open  air  the 
greater    part    of    the    morning    and    is    reasonably 


86  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

healthy,  and  is  started  upon  the  meats  and  vegetables 
first,  he  may  be  given  practically  as  many  helpings 
as  he  will  take  of  these,  or  even  of  the  desserts,  without 
serious  danger  to  his  digestion,  save  during  the  first 
few  days,  or  weeks,  when  he  is  placed  upon  this 
unrestrained  sugar  and  sweet  ration.  When  chil- 
dren have  once  got  the  sugar  hunger  of  their  tissues 
reasonably  satisfied,  they  show  little  or  no  tendency 
to  gorge  themselves  upon  pie,  pudding,  candy,  or 
sweets,  and  a  little  intelligent  oversight  and  gentle 
restraint  is  all  that  is  needed  to  keep  them  within 
bounds.  And  how  they  will  grow  and  gain  weight, 
and  lose  their  irritable  temper  and  whiny  ways 
and  nervousness! 

Half  of  our  "high  strung,"  "difficult,"  nervous 
modern  children  are  sugar-hungry  and  often  sleep- 
hungry  as  well.  Plenty  of  sugar  has  almost  as 
sweetening  an  effect  upon  the  disposition,  as  it  has 
upon  the  flavour  of  food.  One  to  two,  sleep  or  rest 
in  a  darkened  room.  Two  to  four,  play  in  the  open 
air;  four,  afternoon  tea  consisting  of  cookies,  sand- 
wiches, doughnuts,  bread  and  butter,  cake,  jam, 
nuts,  or  almonds  with  either  milk,  or  weak  cocoa. 
Four-thirty  to  six,  play  in  the  open  air,  or  in  a  well- 
ventilated  nursery,  barn  or  play  room,  according 
to  the  season,  with  half  an  hour  to  an  hour  of 
pleasant  lessons  with  plenty  of  pictures  and  demon- 
strations. Six  o'clock,  supper,  consisting  of  eggs, 
fish,  or  some  light  meat  or  cheese  dish,  potatoes, 


FEEDING  THE  HUMAN  CATERPILLAR    87 

a  salad  vegetable  with  bread  and  butter,  toast, 
tea  or  other  hot  cakes,  jam,  cookies  or  fruit  with 
milk  or  weak  cocoa.  Games  or  entertaining  reading, 
or  stones,  until  seven-thirty  or  eight,  according  to 
age,  then  bed.  It  is  a  good  thing  to  leave  a  glass  of 
milk,  or  crackers,  on  a  chair  beside  the  bed  so  that  if 
the  child  wakes  up  in  the  night  and  is  hungry,  he 
can  help  himself;  and  particularly  have  these  where 
he  can  get  at  them  early  in  the  morning  before  the 
regular  breakfast  hour. 

MENUS 

BREAKFAST 

8  o'clock 
Two  slices  of  broiled  bacon  One  boiled  egg 

Hot  rolls 

One  cup  cocoa  or  one  glass  milk 
One  orange 

LUNCHEON 
II  o'clock 

One  glass  milk  (with  cream  in  it) 

One  slice  bread,  butter  and  jam 

DINNER 

I   o'clock 

One  cup  bouillon  One  mutton  chop 

Mashed  potatoes,  peas 

One  cup  apple  and  custard  pudding 

TEA 

4.30  o'clock 

One  glass  milk  (with  cream  in  it) 
One  cup  weak  cocoa  Two  sugar  cookies 


88  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

SUPPER 

6  o'clock 

Minced  beef  on  toast  Potato  straws 

Lettuce 
Stewed  fruit  with  cream  Sponge  cakes 

BREAKFAST 

8  o'clock 

Broiled  fish  or  poached  egg  Water  cress 

Corn  muffins  Baked  apple  with  cream 

Cup  cocoa 

LUNCHEON 

1 1   o'clock 

I  glass  of  milk  with  cream  in  it 
Piece  of  bread  and  butter  with  jelly 

DINNER 
I  o'clock 
Chicken  with  rice  or  potato  balls 

Spinach  or  asparagus  tips 
Rolls  Fruit  Pudding  with  custard  sauce 

TEA 

4.30  o'clock 
One  glass  of  milk        Gingerbread  or  chocolate  cake 

SUPPER 

Creamed  chip  beef  Boiled  macaroni 

Baking  powder  biscuit  with  plum  jelly 

Cocoa 

As  will  be  seen,  the  most  prominent  place  in  this 
dietary  is  assumed  by  varying  proteins  or  "meats." 
This  is  for  the  reason  that  children  are  made  out  of 
proteins  and  fats,  and  would  yield,  on  the  most 


FEEDING  THE  HUMAN  CATERPILLAR    89 

exhaustive  analysis,  only  small  percentages  of  starch. 
Youth  is  the  period  of  growth,  and  if  children  are  to 
enlarge  their  bodies  they  must  be  supplied  with  an 
abundance  of  those  materials  out  of  which  their 
bodies  are  built.  The  rule  is  an  absolutely  unbroken 
one,  throughout  the  whole  of  the  animal  kingdom. 
All  young  mammals  for  instance,  live  for  the  first 
sixth,  or  third  of  their  growth  period  exclusively 
upon  protein  in  the  form  of  milk  and  flesh.  All 
young  birds,  no  matter  what  will  be  their  food  habits 
when  they  grow  up,  have  to  be  fed  throughout  their 
entire  growth  period,  up  to  complete  feathering  and 
flight,  upon  a  diet  consisting,  in  wild  birds,  of 
protein  in  the  form  of  worms,  grubs,  insects,  or  fish; 
and  in  tame  birds  of  hard  boiled  eggs,  scraps 
of  meat,  curds  or  bone  meal. 

The  young  human  animal  is  no  exception  to  the 
rule  of  his  kind.  Furthermore  all  proteins,  or 
"meats,"  including  milk,  as  we  have  seen,  contain 
anywhere  from  one  third  to  one  half  their  bulk  of 
carbohydrates,  or  animal  starches,  chiefly  in  the 
form  of  some  modification  of  sugar.  These  animal 
sugars  and  starches  are  far  the  best  and  most 
digestible  form  in  which  starches  can  be  adminis- 
tered to  the  child.  The  solid  parts  of  milk  for 
instance,  consist  of  about  one  part  protein,  one 
part  fat  and  one  and  a  half  parts  sugar.  Abun- 
dant experience  has  shown  that  if  young  animals 
are  to  be  made  to  grow  rapidly  and  thrive,  they  do 


QO  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

best  when  given  large  amounts,  not  of  starch  or 
vegetable  protein,  but  of  milk,  eggs,  or  meat.  Even 
among  grass-eating  animals,  such  as  cattle  and 
horses,  this  rule  holds,  and  where  pedigreed  calves, 
or  colts,  are  being  forced  to  the  most  rapid  and 
vigorous  growth  for  prize  winning,  or  exhibition 
purposes,  the  food  which  is  found  most  effective 
is  large  amounts  of  rich  milk,  which  is  added  to  their 
regular  dietary  by  the  gallon  and  the  bucketful. 

Nearly  all  the  evils  supposed  to  result  from  ex- 
cessive meat  eating  in  either  children  or  adults, 
have  been  proved  to  be  largely  imaginary.  Uric 
acid,  for  instance,  has  little  or  nothing  to  do 
with  the  amount  of  meat  in  the  dietary,  nor  on  the 
other  hand  has  it  any  positive  connection  with 
the  causation  of  gout,  or  lithemia,  but  is  probably 
one  of  the  symptoms  of  the  underlying  error  of 
metabolism  which  causes  these  conditions.  Meat 
or  proteins  of  any  sort  have  nothing  whatever  to 
do  with  the  causation  of  Bright's  disease,  or  any 
other  form  of  disease  of  the  kidneys.  Nine  tenths 
of  these  are  the  after-results  of  some  acute  in- 
fection like  scarlet  fever,  pneumonia,  tuberculosis, 
typhoid  and  even  common  colds.  All  the  stories 
about  children's  being  made  "nervous"  and  "teeth 
grinders,"  or  "bed  wetters,"  or  "thrown  into  fits 
and  epilepsy"  by  meat  are  little  better  than  fairy 
tales,  or  on  a  par  with  the  old  fable  that  if  you  hold 
a  guinea  pig  up  by  its  tail  its  eyes  will  drop  out. 


FEEDING  THE  HUMAN  CATERPILLAR    91 

These  disturbances  occur  in  a  considerable  per- 
centage of  children  from  various  causes,  epilepsy 
always  from  congenital  ones.  Meat  is,  in  our 
stingy  philosophy,  bad  for  children  largely  because 
it  costs  money!  Ergo:  Any  scrap  of  meat  that  the 
unfortunate  child  happened  to  eat  just  before  the 
restlessness,  or  convulsion,  was  the  cause  of  it. 

The  next  most  prominent  place  in  the  dietary 
should  be  given  to  fat,  particularly  in  the  form  of 
good  butter,  as  children  require  double  the  pro- 
portion of  this  in  their  food  that  adults  do.  The 
nursery  is  and  always  has  been  eternally  and  fun- 
damentally right  in  demanding  plenty  of  butter  on 
its  bread.  No  Bread-and-Scrape  for  it!  All  starches, 
breads,  puddings  and  cereals  are,  with  the  partial 
exception  of  corn  meal,  utterly  lacking  in  fat  and 
consequently  should  be  eaten,  according  to  instinct, 
with  abundance  of  this  element  added  in  the  form  of 
butter,  cream,  or  oil.  Children  should  be  allowed, 
yes  encouraged,  to  eat  butter  and  bread,  rather 
than  bread  and  butter.  Because,  while  our  adult 
needs  call  for  only  about  one  fifth  of  our  total  fuel 
in  the  form  of  fat,  the  child's  more  varied  and  in- 
tense demands  for  both  activity  and  growth  pur- 
poses call  for  from  one  fourth  to  one  third  of  his 
fuel  in  this  form,  as  instanced  in  the  composition 
of  milk  with  nearly  one  third  of  its  solids  fat. 

The  next  most  prominent  role  is  played  by  sugar. 
The  prejudice  against  this  most  useful  and  valuable 


92  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

food  for  children  is  little  better  than  a  superstition 
and,  I  am  happy  to  say,  rapidly  disappearing. 
Instead  of  its  being  a  luxury  and  source  of  danger, 
one  of  our  most  competent  and  conservative,  world- 
experts  upon  diet,  Dr.  Robert  Hutchison,  of  London, 
summed  up  the  feeling  of  the  scientific  world  in 
the  statement  that  "there  have  been  few  more  im- 
portant additions  to  our  dietary,  or  which  have  done 
more  to  promote  the  health  of  the  rising  genera- 
tion, than  our  cheap  and  abundant  supply  of  pure 
sugar."  The  main  arguments  against  its  use  were, 
first,  that  it  cost  money  and,  second,  that  children 
cried  for  it,  and  being  unreasonable  beings,  and  as 
Jonathan  Edwards  gently  expressed  it,  "in  the 
sight  of  God  no  better  than  young  vipers,"  it  was 
therefore  sure  to  be  "bad  for  them."  If  we  had 
listened  to  the  "wisdom  of  babes  and  sucklings" 
and  given  them  what  they  craved  a  century  earlier 
than  we  did,  it  would  have  been  enormously  to  our 
advantage  —  and  theirs!  To  "become  as  little  chil- 
dren" is  a  pretty  good  preparation  for  health  and 
wholesomeness  as  well  as  for  entrance  into  the 
kingdom  of  heaven. 

Our  programme  also  calls  for  a  large  amount  of 
sleep.  Ten  to  eleven  hours  at  night  and  an  hour 
in  the  middle  of  the  day,  but  that  again  is  simply 
one  of  the  Magna  Charta  rights  of  the  young, 
growing,  human  animal.  Sleep  is  not  a  negative, 
but  a  positive  process.  Our  up-building  processes 


FEEDING  THE  HUMAN  CATERPILLAR    93 

are  at  a  maximum  during  sleep,  our  down-breaking 
ones,  while  awake. 

Food-and-play-and-sleep,  sleep-and-food-and-play 
— these  are  the  magic  circles  of  childhood.  Our 
best  tonic  for  improving  a  child's  appetite  is  to  put  it 
to  bed.  Many  of  our  lean,  nervous,  overconscien- 
tious,  restless  modern  children  need,  instead  of  more 
play  and  amusement,  more  sleep,  or  rest  in  bed. 
If  your  child  is  nervous,  excitable,  easily  tired,  with 
a  poor  appetite  and  pasty  colour,  keep  him  in  bed, 
in  a  room  with  windows  wide  open,  every  morning 
until  nine  or  ten  o'clock;  make  him  lie  down  on 
the  lounge  again  at  twelve  for  an  hour  or  more 
and  again  at  four,  and  get  him  to  bed  early.  Mean- 
time feed  him  well  with  things  that  he  likes,  including 
plenty  of  meat,  butter,  sugar,  cake,  and  fruit,  and 
you  will  be  astonished  to  see  how  his  appetite, 
nutrition,  and  temper  improve.  There  is  no  par- 
ticular merit  in  sending  children  to  bed  with  the 
chickens,  so  long  as  they  are  allowed  to  sleep  as 
late  as  they  want  to  in  the  morning.  Sleeping 
to  grow  and  get  an  appetite,  eating  to  gratify  that 
appetite,  playing  to  get  another  one  —  this  is  the 
whole  duty  of  child. 

But  what,  challenges  some  one,  will  become  of 
the  poor  child's  mind  all  this  time?  Did  you  ever 
happen  to  know  of  a  healthy,  happy,  laughing 
child  that  was  not  considered  "bright"  and  prom- 
ising? A  child's  mind  during  this  period  grows 


94  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

just  as  its  organ,  the  brain,  does,  through  the  use 
of  his  senses  and  the  exercise  of  his  muscles.  Like 
the  bear's  cubs,  in  the  old  legend,  which  were  born 
as  shapeless  lumps  and  "licked  into  shape"  by  the 
mother  bear,  children  are  born  little  lumps  of  possi- 
bilities and  played  into  shape,  both  body  and  mind. 
It  needs  no  argument  to  prove  that  children  have 
an  instinct  for  this  kind  of  development,  just  as 
they  have  for  food  and  for  sleep  —  an  instinct  as 
keen  and  intense  that  it  will  sometimes,  if  allowed, 
overmaster  all  others,  vital  and  fundamental  as 
they  are.  Children,  if  not  watched  and  gently 
checked,  will  often  rush  away  from  the  table  before 
they  have  fully  satisfied  their  appetites  in  order  to 
resume  their  play.  They  will  forget  that  most 
important  epoch  of  their  day,  the  dinner-hour,  in 
the  excitement  of  a  game. 

The  normal  state  of  the  healthy  child  is  wriggling, 
or  other  more  active  motion,  constantly,  save  when  he 
is  asleep  or  feeding.  This  the  schoolroom  deliber- 
ately sets  out  to  put  a  stop  to,  and  by  so  doing 
denies  him  his  divine  right  to  grow,  utterly  oblivious 
of  the  fact  that  a  child  will  learn  quickest  on  his  feet, 
yes,  on  the  run!  It  does  not  make  much  differ- 
ence what  kind  of  seats  and  desks  your  kinder- 
garten or  schoolroom  has,  provided  the  child  is  not 
expected  to  sit  in  them  for  more  than  fifteen  minutes 
at  a  time,  at  this  stage  of  his  career.  What  a  child 
most  vitally  needs  in  the  way  of  mental  development 


FEEDING  THE  HUMAN  CATERPILLAR    95 

is  acquaintance  with  and  knowledge  of  his  sur- 
roundings —  training  to  see  accurately  and  to  draw 
conclusions  from  what  he  sees;  training  to  touch 
and  handle  and  mould  and  work  with  things;  train- 
ing to  hear  and  remember  what  he  hears,  and  to 
work  out  the  meaning  of  sounds,  whether  articulate 
or  inarticulate,  their  relations  to  one  another,  their 
harmony  or  dissonance,  their  connections  and  asso- 
ciations with  sights  and  smells  and  touch-per- 
ceptions; training  to  smell  —  to  tell  the  difference 
between  flowers  and  filth,  between  cream  and  cod- 
liver  oil,  between  foul  air  and  fresh,  to  reason  out 
why  he  loves  one  and  hates  the  other.  There  is 
very  little  need,  at  this  stage,  to  teach  a  child  what 
he  should  like  and  what  he  should  dislike,  only 
why  he  likes  good  and  why  he  dislikes  bad. 

Let  the  child  learn  to  speak  by  speaking,  under 
correction  and  intelligent  supervision.;  to  read  by 
hunting  for  the  names  and  stories  of  his  favourite 
pictures;  to  write  by  sending  messages  to  others 
about  what  he  his  found  out  for  himself,  or  wishes 
to  communicate  to  them;  to  cipher  by  actually 
counting  his  jackstones  and  marbles  and  pocket- 
knives,  by  adding  his  gains  and  subtracting  his 
losses,  by  multiplying  his  own  profits  and  dividing 
the  other  fellow's,  and  he  will  master  the  Three 
R's  without  so  much  as  the  sight  of  a  bench  or  the 
taste  of  a  stick. 

Let  every  family  have  its  own  garden,  with  sand- 


96  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

heap,  swings,  and  tool-house,  with  carpenter's  bench 
and  plenty  of  tools  to  dig  and  hack  with  and  ground 
that  can  be  dug  and  hacked  to  heart's  content  with- 
out blame  or  criticism.  Where  this  is  impossible, 
let  six  or  a  dozen  families  club  together  and  provide 
a  play  garden,  with  proper  equipment,  for  the  joint 
use  of  all  their  children.  Let  them  pick  out  some 
sweet-tempered,  sensible,  healthy  girl,  with  a  good 
accent  and  attractive  manners,  who  loves  children 
and  has  been  trained  to  direct  and  assist  in  their 
games  and  sports,  and  turn  over  the  whole  brood 
to  her  for  from  two  to  five  hours  each  day. 

Let  the  regular  meeting-place  of  the  "club ".be 
at  one  of  these  play  gardens  and  let  this  be  equipped 
with  a  clean,  well-lighted,  airy  barn  or  shed,  in 
which  plays  or  games  can  be  carried  on  in  wet  or 
stormy  weather.  Then  once  or  twice  a  week  let 
a  good-natured  local  carpenter,  or  some  manual- 
training  teacher,  give  lessons  in  the  use  of  tools 
and  the  building  of  boxes,  toys,  and  other  contrap- 
tions, to  both  boys  and  girls.  Let  them  be  given 
gardens  and  pet  stock,  which  they  shall  take  care 
of,  and  be  responsible  for,  under  the  guidance  of 
some  one  competent  to  teach  them. 

Primary  literature  and  history  can  both  be  taught 
in  the  form  of  the  story,  regular  visits  can  be  made, 
as  the  weather  permits,  first  and  most  important 
of  all,  to  woods  and  brooks  and  fields  and  gardens 
in  the  neighbourhood;  then  if  the  club  be  in  a  small 


FEEDING  THE  HUMAN  CATERPILLAR    97 

town,  or  the  country,  to  poultry-yards,  dairy-farms, 
sheep-shearings,  and  harvest  fields.  If  in  a  city, 
to  zoological  gardens,  botanical  gardens,  museums, 
markets,  docks,  etc. 

Then  if  the  children  be  encouraged  to  compare 
notes  with,  and  describe  to,  one  another  what  they 
have  seen,  in  clear,  simple,  correct  English,  to 
write  down  their  impressions,  to  make  pictures 
of  them,  sing  the  songs,  or  chant  the  poems,  or  dance 
the  dances  appropriate  to  the  place  and  things,  the 
season  and  time  of  life,  they  will  make  a  healthful, 
natural,  happy  progress  and  growth  toward  even 
the  highest  standards  of  intellectual  and  moral 
accomplishment,  with  far  greater  certainty  and  com- 
fort and  just  as  rapidly  as  under  our  present,  un- 
natural indoor,  forcing  system. 

Until,  however,  this  educational  millennium  comes, 
and  the  education  of  a  child  is  adjusted  to  his 
growth  needs  —  making  the  great  outdoors  his 
schoolroom,  teaching  hand  and  foot  and  eye  and 
body  in  the  sun  and  the  wind,  the  fields  and  the 
streams,  with  excursions  to  shop  and  factory  and 
museums  and  places  bustling  with  the  world's  work, 
all  in  the  companionship  of  its  own  kind  and  with 
sympathetic  supervision  —  we  can  do  much  to  adjust 
him  to  the  school  and  to  watch  out  for  signs  of 
friction  and  pressure. 

The  first  and  most  significant  sign  is  the  appetite. 
Any  child  that  does  not  eat,  and  eat  at  least  once 


98  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

a  day,  like  a  saw-mill,  "with  eagerness,  avidity,  and 
an  audible  noise,  unless  restrained,  is  not  healthy. 
He  ought  not  to  eat  like  a  pig,  of  course,  but  he 
should  want  to.  Similarly,  a  child  that  is  fussy 
and  particular  —  finicky  —  in  regard  to  the  kind 
and  appearance  of  his  food,  and  with  more  dis- 
likes and  antipathies  than  likes,  is  not  in  a  normal 
condition  and  cannot  grow  properly  until  his  squeam- 
ishness  is  corrected.  This  can  often  be  done  by 
giving  him  real  foods,  such  as  his  instincts  call  for, 
cooked  in  an  appetizing  manner  but  very  fre- 
quently the  lack  of  appetite  has  nothing  to  do  with 
his  food  or  his  digestion  as  such,  but  is  caused  by 
over  confinement  indoors  or  by  lack  of  sleep.  If 
your  child  has  no  appetite,  do  not  fuss  at  him  or 
pile  things  on  his  plate  or  try  to  tempt  his  appetite 
with  dainties;  send  him  to  get  one  —  to  the  woods, 
or  the  garden,  or,  if  necessary,  to  the  gutter  — 
anywhere  where  he  will  meet  other  young  animals, 
human  and  otherwise,  and  roll  and  tumble  and  fight 
with  them.  Pay  no  attention  to  his  school  hours 
meanwhile  —  he  will  catch  up  all  the  ground  he  has 
lost  and  make  much  faster  progress  when  he  gets 
to  eating  properly  and  growing  once  more.  If  this 
prescription  fails,  look  carefully  into  the  amount 
of  sleep  the  child  is  taking.  If  this,  at  his  age,  be 
less  than  ten  hours  of  sound,  solid,  unbroken  sleep, 
and  especially  if  the  child  be  thin  and  nervous  and 
excitable,  unhappy  unless  he  is  perpetually  doing 


FEEDING  THE  HUMAN  CATERPILLAR    99 

something,  and  driving  eagerly  from  one  thing  to 
another,  then  devote  your  energy  to  seeing  that  he 
gets  all  the  sleep  that  he  can  possibly  be  induced  to 
take  in  the  twenty-four  hours.  No  child  ever  yet 
slept  too  much,  and  it  is  little  short  of  crime  to  make 
any  child  get  out  of  bed  in  the  morning  until  he  is 
widely  and  vividly  awake  —  indeed,  until  you 
cannot  keep  him  under  the  bedclothes  any  longer. 
Make  him  lie  in  bed  every  morning  until  ten  or 
eleven  o'clock  if  necessary.  Put  him  to  bed  again 
at  any  time  that  he  appears  to  be  fretful,  or  cross, 
or  tired,  or  dissatisfied  with  his  surroundings  and 
himself,  and  get  him  to  bed  by  at  least  eight  or 
half-past  in  the  evening;  and  you  will  be  surprised 
how  he  will  plump  out  and  his  nerve  tantrums  sub- 
side and  his  appetite  come  back 

Peculiarities,  oddities,  and  crankiness  of  dis- 
position in  children  should  be  watched  for  with  a 
vigilant  eye.  The  natural,  healthy  child  is  a  sunny, 
even-tempered,  easily  pleased,  happy-go-lucky  little 
mortal;  and  when  he  begins  to  be  difficult  to  get 
along  with,  it  is  a  sign  neither  of  original  sin  nor 
of  pure  perversity,  but  of  something  fundamentally 
wrong.  It  may  be,  of  course,  that  you  are  setting 
him  a  bad  example.  If  so,  you  cannot  stop  it  any 
too  soon.  Nine  times  out  of  ten,  however,  bad 
temper,  waywardness,  fretting,  and  uncertainty 
of  disposition  in  children  are  the  symptoms  of  some 
disease  or  disturbance  of  nutrition.  Look  well  to 


ioo  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

their  appetite,  their  food,  their  sleep,  their  eyes, 
their  ears,  their  teeth,  and  you  will  usually  find  the 
cause  of  their  "fractiousness"  in  some  one  of  these. 
In  a  small  but  very  important  percentage  these 
peculiarities  of  temper,  fits  of  crying  on  slight  provo- 
cation, tendency  to  mope  by  themselves  and  avoid 
other  children,  morbid  conscientiousness,  worry 
over  little  details  of  work  or  play,  and  above  all 
things  early  piety,  are  signs  of  a  deeper  inherent 
defect  of  disposition  and  balance,  which,  if  un- 
checked, may  result  in  some  definite  form  of  perma- 
nent mental  disturbance.  Eight  tenths  of  those 
who  become  insane  in  later  life  were  "peculiar"  as 
children.  Fortunately,  at  least  three  fourths  of 
those  who  are  born  with  a  tendency  to  lack  of 
balance  can  be  trained  and  educated  to  overcome 
it.  The  prevention  of  insanity  should  begin  before 
the  seventh  year.  Fully  one  half  of  the  household 
discomforts  and  family  difficulties  and  unhappiness 
in  later  life  are  due  to  the  neglect  or  injudicious 
treatment  of  little,  inborn  peculiarities  of  this  sort 
which,  though  they  have  never  gone  the  length 
of  complete  unbalance,  were  not  trained  out  or 
corrected  in  childhood.  This  sort  of  latent  insanity 
and  eccentricity  causes  as  much  suffering  and  un- 
happiness to  humanity  as  any  known  vice;  and  it 
is  most  likely  to  occur  in  the  childnen  of  the  over- 
pious,  the  unnecessarily  good,  and  the  disgracefully 
rich. 


FEEDING  THE  HUMAN  CAT  ERPILLAR  101 

As  during  the  child's  larval  stage  in  the  nursery, 
so  now  during  his  caterpillar  one  in  the  kindergarten, 
the  best  physical  test  that  can  be  applied  is  to  weigh 
him  at  least  once  in  two  months.  If  he  is  not  gaining 
steadily  in  either  weight  or  height,  and  generally 
both,  there  is  ground  for  investigation  of  his  con- 
dition and  habits.  Sometimes  children,  particularly 
at  this  age,  will  grow  fairly  rapidly  in  height  with 
comparatively  little  gain  in  weight  by  a  curious 
sort  of  readjustment  of  their  already  acquired  bodily 
substance  —  taking  it  from  their  breadth,  as  it 
were,  to  add  to  their  length.  But  even  this  should 
not  be  allowed  to  occur  for  more  than  six  months 
at  a  time  without  relieving  the  child  in  every  possible 
way  from  any  pressure  of  school,  or  of  regularity 
of  hours  according  to  any  fixed  scheme  which  he 
may  happen  to  be  under. 

Another  thing  to  be  watched  closely  is  the  ex- 
pression and  colour  of  the  child.  A  healthy,  growing 
child  is  happy ,  most  of  his  waking  hours,  and  looks  it. 
A  child  whose  eyebrows  are  knitted  in  a  perpetual 
frown  generally  has  eye  trouble,  or  headache  due 
to  digestive  trouble,  or  lack  of  sleep,  or  perhaps  nasal 
obstruction.  Habits  of  scowling  or  looking  care- 
worn should  be  promptly  referred  to  the  family 
physician.  If  the  child  has  a  frequently  opened 
mouth  or  even,  without  this,  has  thickened  or  hang- 
ing lips,  which  are  cracked  in  the  morning,  with 
small  nostrils  and  a  vacant,  heavy  expression, 


102  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

adenoids   would   at  once   suggest   themselves,   and 
should  be  looked  for  by  a  competent  specialist. 

If  a  child  sits  about  with  a  flushed  face  and  either 
dull  or  bright  eyes,  half  covered  with  drooping  lids, 
holds  his  head  as  if  it  were  a  burden  to  him  and 
mopes,  it  is  well  to  suspect  a  fever  of  some  sort, 
possibly  only  a  common  cold,  possibly  one  of  the 
mild  infections  of  childhood,  such  as  measles, 
whooping-cough,  chicken-pox,  or  scarlatina.  In 
any  case,  he  should  be  given  a  warm  bath  and  at 
once  put  to  bed  in  a  quiet  room  by  himself,  and  if 
he  does  not  fall  asleep,  or  is  not  markedly  better  in 
six  or  eight  hours,  the  family  doctor  should  be  sent 
for.  No  cold  or  fever  in  a  child  is  so  trifling  that 
it  should  be  neglected.  Nine  tenths  of  all  the  serious 
diseases  and  disturbances  of  childhood  begin  with 
the  symptoms  of  a  common  cold,  and  common 
colds  themselves,  in  the  mass,  cause  more  damage 
to  hearing  than  all  other  diseases  put  together,  and 
as  many  injuries  to  the  heart,  kidney,  liver,  and 
nervous  system.  A  stitch  in  time  here  saves  not 
merely  nine  but  ninety. 


CHAPTER  VII 

OUR    IVORY    KEEPERS     OF    THE    GATE 

AAAN  is  known  by  the  teeth  that  he  keeps. 
The  worst  thing  that  can  happen  to  our 
teeth  is  for  them  not  to  have  enough  to 
do  —  it  is  the  worst  thing  that  can  happen  to  us 
also.  Spiritualized  and  cultured  as  we  have  become, 
we  still  fight  the  battle  of  life  with  our  teeth,  though 
we  no  longer  chew  our  enemies'  ears  or  throats.  In 
the  beginning,  the  mouth  made  the  face.  Where  it 
was  located  began  the  head-end  of  the  organism, 
then  the  smelling  department  settled  itself  just 
above  it,  the  lookout  department  just  above  that, 
the  ears  next,  and  finally  the  brain  to  boss  the  whole. 
The  mouth  already  has  done  as  much  for  the  race 
in  the  prehistoric  period  as  the  sounds  which  issue 
from  it  have  done  since.  The  psalmist  who  said, 
"Keep  thy  mouth  with  diligence,"  was  a  good 
dentist  as  well  as  a  sound  philosopher.  If  he 
had  added,  and  with  a  tooth  brush,  he  would  have 
been  strictly  up  to  date. 

Our  teeth  still  make  our  expressions,  give  to  our 
faces  the  air  of  firmness  or  weakness,  determi- 
nation or  irresolution,  make  their  shape  oval,  tri- 

103 


104  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

angular,  or  square,  give  us  the  wolfish,  the  rabbit- 
like,  the  horse-like,  or  the  bull-dog  expression. 
Many  of  our  most  important  expressions  are  teeth 
expressions.  When  we  smile  we  show  all  our  pearly 
weapons  resting  peacefully  in  the  sheath,  as  it  were; 
all  our  cards  are  on  the  table;  there  is  no  knife  up  our 
sleeves  and  no  whiskers  to  deceive  you.  When  we 
frown,  we  inevitably  clench  our  teeth  together  and  set 
our  jaws,  as  if  we  were  locking  them  in  the  body  of 
the  enemy.  When  we  sneer,  we  wrinkle  up  one  side 
of  our  upper  lip  to  bare  the  big  ivory  dagger,  our 
canine  tooth,  or  rather  the  place  where  we  used  to 
carry  it. 

Is  it  any  wonder  that  when  such  foundation 
stones  of  the  body  go  wrong  the  whole  body  ma- 
chine is  jarred  askew?  Bone  cored,  enamel  coated 
and  rock  ribbed  as  the  hills,  as  they  are,  they  are 
more  absolutely  under  our  control  than  almost 
any  other  structure  in  the  body.  Neglect  them, 
and  they  decay  at  once.  Give  them  proper  atten- 
tion and  they  will  keep  on  repairing  themselves  for 
forty,  fifty,  sixty  years.  The  first  thing  is  to  give 
them  plenty  to  do,  for  more  reasons  than  one. 
Poor  food  means  poor  teeth.  Look  at  them  with 
a  biologist's  eye,  and  you  will  see  that  they  con- 
tain samples  of  every  known  kind  of  teeth  possessed 
by  any  animal  —  incisors,  canines,  premolars  and 
molars,  flesh-eating,  grain-eating,  nut-eating,  fruit- 
eating,  carnivorous,  herbivorous  and  omnivorous. 


OUR  IVORY  KEEPERS  OF  THE  GATE   105 

Moral  :  Give  them  all  something  to  do  and 
often! 

Savage  teeth  are  better  than  civilized  in  early 
life  because  they  get  more  to  do,  from  cleaning  fish 
and  killing  snakes  and  chewing  walrus  hide  to 
gnawing  off  roots  and  digging  for  grubs  in  rotten 
logs.  They  decay,  however,  sooner  than  ours  do, 
because  the  food  supply '  is  scant  and  coarse  and 
uncertain. 

Give  children  plenty  "of  roughening"  to  chew, 
which  Heaven  knows  they  are  willing  enough  to  do 
—  and  they  will  get  the  pearly  vigour  of  the  savage 
tooth  with  the  endurance  of  the  Caucasian's.  Above 
all,  the  food  should  be  of  such  a  character  as  to  give 
exercise  and  massage  to  the  gums.  Part  of  this 
can  be  given  by  plenty  of  coarse  food  —  in  addition 
to  real  food,  not  as  a  substitute  for  it  —  and  part 
by  intentional  and  vigorous  friction  with  the  tooth 
brush.  To  brush  the  gums  well  is  half  the  value 
of  brushing  the  teeth. 

The  next  thing  is  to  keep  them  thoroughly  clean 
and  leave  no  particles  of  food  between  them  to 
decay;  and  in  the  process  give  off  acids  and  enzymes, 
which  attack  and  eat  into  the  teeth.  The  mouth 
makes  a  beautiful  hot  house  for  "bugs"  of  all  sorts, 
but  they  have  got  to  have  something  dead  to  live 
on.  If  the  gums  and  teeth  are  kept  thoroughly 
alive  and  vigorous,  they  can  get  little  foothold,  but 
if  some  carrion  in  the  shape  of  scraps  of  food  be 


106  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

left  them  to  form  a  nest  in,  then  they  can  develop 
a  vigour  which  will  enable  them  to  attack  the 
teeth  and  gums.  The  food  most  likely  to  set  up 
this  dangerous  kind  of  "bug  breeding"  is  starch, 
because  the  fluids  produced  by  its  fermentation 
are  acid,  while  those  produced  by  the  decay  of 
meat  are  alkaline  and  have  little  injurious  effect 
upon  the  teeth  or  gums,  though  they  are  more 
offensive  to  taste  and  smell. 

Every  animal,  man  included,  hangs  on  to  existence 
by  his  teeth.  If  you  know  the  teeth,  you  know  the 
animal.  We  talk  of  the  value  of  art  as  a  means  of 
self-expression,  but  it  is  not  to  be  mentioned  in  the 
same  day  of  the  week  from  this  point  of  view. 
There  is,  however,  the  "Alice  in  Wonderland" 
question  which  has  been  gravely  propounded 
throughout  the  centuries  with  regard  to  mind, 
whether  the  man  expresses  himself  in  his  teeth, 
or  the  teeth  express  themselves  in  the  man.  They 
certainly  have  a  large  share  in  determining  his 
expression  in  the  facial  sense.  Our  jaws  are  sim- 
ply arches  of  gristle,  hardened  by  deposits  of  lime, 
a  la  coral  reef,  into  bone  for  the  purpose  of  carry- 
ing and  socketing  our  teeth. 

The  feeble,  retreating,  sheep-like  chin,  the  weakly 
amiable,  rabbit-like,  projecting  upper  jaw  and  lip, 
the  rounded  angles  of  the  jaw  in  the  child  and 
woman,  and  the  square  bull-dog  projection  of  the 
man  of  grit  and  aggressiveness  are  all  alike  func- 


OUR  IVORY  KEEPERS  OF  THE  GATE   107 

tions  of  the  size  and  shape  of  the  teeth  that  they 
have  to  carry. 

The  loose  wrinkled  lips,  baggy  cheeks  and  sloping 
angles  of  the  jaw  of  the  old  man  or  old  woman, 
which  give  such  an  air  of  collapse  and  indecision  to 
the  countenance,  are  due  to  the  absorption  of  the 
bone  from  the  loss  of  the  teeth  and  the  wasting 
away  of  the  bony  grip-hold  of  the  great  Masseter 
muscles. 

The  enormous  importance  and  significance  of 
the  animal's  teeth  need  of  course  no  argument. 
No  other  single  feature  is  so  illuminating  as  to  his 
character  and  habits,  nor  so  universally  relied  on 
for  purposes  of  classification.  The  reason  of 
course  is  obvious.  For  when  you  look  at  an 
animal's  teeth  you  can  tell  not  only  what  kind  of 
food  he  eats,  but  how  he  catches  it  and  kills  it  and 
also  how  he  defends  himself  against  attack.  That 
animals  which  have  huge,  sabre-like  canines,  small 
incisors,  and  jagged,  saw-tooth  molars  and  pre- 
molars  live  upon  flesh  which  they  capture  alive, 
and  defend  themselves  from  attack  with  their 
teeth,  is  of  course  as  obvious  as  that  two  and  two 
make  four.  On  the  other  hand,  some  animals  have 
lost  or  dwarfed  their  canine  daggers,  broadened 
their  molars,  or  grinding  teeth,  into  veritable  mill- 
stones, and  retained  their  incisor  teeth  in  only  the 
lower  jaw,  cutting  their  grassy  and  leafy  foods  with 
the  chisel-like  edge  of  these  against  a  cartilaginous 


io8  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

f 
pad  in  the  upper  jaw,  like  the  sheep  and  the  cow. 

Evidently  these  animals  do  not  live  upon  flesh,  or 
catch  their  prey  struggling  and  alive,  or  fight  with 
their  teeth,  but  with  horns  which  have  developed 
for  that  purpose. 

In  short,  so  exquisitely  are  the  teeth  of  an  animal 
adapted  to  his  vital  demands  and  his  habits  that 
a  whole  animal  can  be  reconstructed  from  the  dis- 
covery of  a  single  tooth.  This  has  been  done 
repeatedly  by  paleontologists,  and  the  fossil  of  the 
remainder  of  the  animal,  afterward  found,  fitting 
the  description  in  every  important  detail. 

Though  our  own  teeth  have  been  built  up  in 
every  line  and  detail  upon  precisely  the  same  prin- 
ciples and  by  the  same  methods  of  response  to  de- 
mands as  obtain  all  through  the  animal  kingdom, 
they  are  no  longer  of  such  dominant  and  exclusive 
vital  importance.  For  ever  since  we  assumed  the 
erect  position  and  left  our  forepaws  free  to  hurl 
the  spear  and  swing  the  club  and  grasp  the  tool, 
free  from  the  dull  mechanical  duty  of  propping  or 
supporting  the  body,  the  hand  has  taken  the  domi- 
nant place  as  the  food  getter  and  the  fighter. 

Indeed,  this  is  precisely  what  has  landed  us  in 
the  trouble  we  imagine  ourselves  to  be  in  as  regards 
our  teeth.  The  developments  of  the  hand  have 
enabled  us  to  outlive  our  teeth.  Only  that  is  the 
sole  reason  why  there  is  so  much  wailing  over 
their  alleged  decadence.  If  we  simply  peacefully 


died  in  times  of  famine,  when  our  teeth  became 
bad,  as  we  used  to  all  through  the  stages  of  savagery 
and  the  earlier  ones  of  barbarism,  we  should  have 
had  comparatively  little  need  for  the  dentist.  But 
we  don't  seem  to  take  kindly  to  the  idea  of  solving 
the  problem  in  this  way. 

We  have  as  perfect  and  lasting  a  set  of  teeth  as 
any  animal  living.  Only  we  don't  give  them  enough 
exercise  in  the  first  place,  and  insist  on  outliving 
them  in  the  second,  and  then  turn  round  and 
blame  them.  Our  impressions  about  some  things 
are  most  extraordinary  and  naive.  We  are  quite 
sure,  because  we  have  suffered  from  toothache  and 
had  gumboils  and  cavities  come  in  our  teeth,  that 
there  is  something  peculiarly  rotten  in  this  human 
"state  of  Denmark"  that  is  to  be  found  nowhere 
else  in  the  animal  world. 

But  this  is  simply  and  solely  because  we  have 
never  been  a  dog,  or  a  cat,  or  a  horse,  or  a  rabbit. 
Every  known  form  of  disease  of  the  human  teeth 
is  to  be  matched  or  paralleled  in  some  form  of 
animal.  Any  veterinarian  will  tell  you  that,  next 
to  the  hoofs,  the  part  of  a  horse  that  gives  him  the 
most  trouble  is  the  teeth.  Any  dog  fancier  can 
relate  to  you  histories  of  abscesses  of  the  gum, 
loosenings  and  sheddings  of  the  teeth,  ulcerated 
gums,  gumboils,  etc.,  in  his  canine  pets  and  charges, 
by  the  dozen  and  the  score. 

Nearly   all  wild   animals  when  confined   in  zoo- 


no  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

logical  gardens  are  apt  to  develop  trouble  with 
their  teeth,  and  iron  instruments  —  or  more  prop- 
perly,  machines,  like  those  used  for  pulling  up 
stumps  by  the  roots  in  clearings  —  have  to  be 
invented  for  extracting  the  teeth  of  elephants  and 
rhinoceroses.  Whenever  a  particular  beast,  tiger 
or  camel,  mongoose,  zebra,  tapir  or  what  not  begins 
to  show  signs  of  restlessness  and  cry  out  with  pain, 
the  first  thing  the  keeper  suspects  is  the  tooth- 
ache. Precisely  to  what  extent  these  conditions 
occur  in  the  wild  state  we  do  not  know,  for  the 
obvious  reason  that  so  few  wild  animals  come  to 
any  post  mortem  table,  except  that  of  the  stomachs 
of  their  natural  enemies. 

Diseases  of  the  teeth  and  jaws  are  found  in  almost 
every  variety  of  wild  animal  in  a  state  of  captivity. 
These,  however,  are  not  as  frequent  as  under  domes- 
tication or  civilization,  partly  of  course  from  the  grim 
reason  that  whenever  an  animal  reaches  a  certain  de- 
gree of  disability  in  its  teeth  it  is  apt  to  either  starve 
to  death  or  to  become  so  much  weakened  by  star- 
vation as  to  be  readily  captured  by  its  pursuers. 

Zoologists,  veterinarians  and  breeders  of  pet  stock 
agree  that  nearly  all  varieties  of  animals  suffer 
much  from  diseases  of  the  teeth,  and  would  develop 
them  in  almost  as  high  a  degree  as  man  if  they  were 
placed  in  an  environment  that  protected  them  from 
starvation  on  the  one  hand  and  destruction  on  the 
other,  when  their  teeth  fail  them. 


OUR  IVORY  KEEPERS  OF  THE  GATE   m 

Another  thing  which  we  have  universally  and 
commonly  taken  for  granted,  upon  utterly  insuf- 
ficient foundation,  is  that  modern  teeth  are  becom- 
ing degenerate,  are  giving  way  under  the  strain  of 
civilization,  and  are  far  worse  than  those  of  the 
savage.  This  discouraging  conclusion  is  based  upon 
a  number  of  considerations,  most  of  which  have 
the  same  broad  and  substantial  foundation,  and 
that  is  our  massive  and  exhaustive  ignorance  of 
the  actual  facts. 

The  supporting  facts  commonly  cited  are: 

First,  that  our  teeth  are  decaying  earlier  and  more 
frequently  than  they  did  a  few  generations  ago; 
that  we  support  at  least  five  times  as  many  dentists 
as  we  used  to,  and  that  our  teeth  must  be  going  to 
decay,  first,  because  we  take  so  much  of  their  proper 
work  from  them  by  mincing  and  cutting  our  food, 
and,  second,  that  we  overheat  them  with  hot  bever- 
ages and  dishes,  or  injure  them  by  cold  drinks  or 
creams  —  according  to  the  prejudice  of  the  observer. 

Scarcely  one  of  these  alleged  "facts"  has  a  leg  to 
stand  on,  when  we  come  to  examine  it  scientifically: 
First,  for  the  broad  and  conclusive  reason  that  we 
have  absolutely  no  accurate  data  as  to  the  condition 
of  the  teeth  two  or  three  generations  ago,  the  diseases 
of  teeth  in  savages,  or  the  actual  effects  upon  our 
teeth  of  the  strains  to  which  they  were  submitted 
in  savagery,  and  those  to  which  they  are  sub- 
mitted in  civilization.  In  fact,  most  of  the  ac- 


ii2  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

curate  data  that  we  possess  point  in  the  direction  of 
the  same  conclusion  as  regards  animals'  teeth,  and 
that  is  that  the  modern  tooth  is  in  no  important  way 
inferior  to  any  other  human  tooth  that  has  preceded 
it.  But  here  up  will  go  hands  and  eyebrows  of 
remonstrance  at  once.  For  have  not  all  of  our 
travellers,  explorers  and  other  writers  of  fiction 
commented  on  the  "gleaming  ivories"  of  the  negro, 
and  the  broad,  healthy  white  teeth  of  the  Indians, 
Malays  and  uncivilized  races  generally?  This  may 
be  admitted  at  once,  and  we  will  volunteer  the  further 
information  that  one  of  the  criteria  of  classification 
of  human  races  is  the  size  of  their  teeth,  particu- 
larly of  the  front  or  incisors.  This  divides  them 
into  three  groups,  called  megadont,  mesodont  and 
Microdont  (big- teeth,  middle- teeth  and  small- teeth), 
with  the  savages  in  the  big-teeth  class. 

However,  both  of  these  statements  are  based  on 
misconceptions,  the  first  of  which  you  can  readily 
test  for  yourself,  if  you  are  sufficiently  interested  to 
do  so,  by  asking  the  first  negro  of  your  acquaintance 
that  you  meet  to  let  you  look  at  his  teeth.  Your 
first  impression  will  be  that  he  has  unusually  broad, 
white,  ivory-like  teeth.  The  first  part  of  this  is 
correct:  they  are  broad.  The  second,  however,  is 
chiefly  due  to  the  contrast  with  his  black  or  coffee- 
coloured  skin.  And  when  you  get  him  to  open  his 
mouth  and  evert  his  lips  so  as  to  throw  his  teeth 
simply  into  contrast  with  the  red  mucus  membrane 


OUR  IVORY  KEEPERS  OF  THE  GATE   113 

you  will  see  that  in  eight  cases  out  of  ten,  instead  of 
being  whiter  than  your  own,  they  are  yellow.  And 
this  is  even  more  strikingly  true  of  Indian  and 
Mongolian  teeth,  both  of  which  are  megadont. 

As  to  the  second  impression,  that  the  teeth  of 
the  savage  are  comparatively  free  from  disease 
because  he  lives  a  natural  life  and  uses  them  vigor- 
ously, this  is  simply  part  of  the  ancient  "noble 
savage"  delusion.  Any  dentist  who  has  practised 
extensively  in  the  South,  or  in  any  place  where  there 
are  considerable  numbers  of  negroes,  will  tell  you 
that  their  teeth  are  frightfully  subject  to  diseases 
of  all  sorts,  just  like  their  white  neighbours.  Grant- 
ing this,  it  may  of  course  be  retorted  that  this  is 
due  to  the  abnormal  condition  of  civilization  under 
which  they  have  been  compelled  to  live.  But  here 
comes  in  another  line  of  evidence,  and  that  a  rather 
unexpected  one. 

It  has  been  a  matter  of  common  observation 
among  anthropologists  and  anatomists  that  the 
teeth  of  the  skulls  contained  in  the  various  collections 
in  the  Continental  and  other  museums,  and  those 
examined  in  the  catacombs  and  other  burying 
grounds,  were  very  frequently  missing  or  diseased. 
But  it  was  only  some  fifteen  or  twenty  years  ago 
that  expert  dentists  began  to  pay  attention  to  this 
problem.  One  of  these,  since  dead,  Doctor  Patrick, 
of  Bellville,  111.,  examined  a  large  series  of  skulls  of 
alleged  Mound  Builders  and  other  American  Indian 


1 14  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

tribes  with  reference  to  the  condition  of  their  teeth, 
with  the  astonishing  result  of  finding  first  every 
known  disease  and  deformity  of  the  teeth  present 
which  is  to  be  discovered  in  civilization.  Decay  of 
the  teeth  themselves,  abscesses  of  the  gums,  wasting 
away  of  the  gums  with  loss  of  the  teeth,  which  had 
evidently  occurred  in  life,  malocclusions  and  mal- 
formations of  all  sorts  were  not  only  present,  but 
occurred  in  as  large  percentages  as  are  found  in 
civilized  mouths  to-day.  There  is  little  new  under 
the  sun,  after  all. 

Next,  as  to  the  number  of  dentists  that  we  support: 
This  is  so  ancient  and  obvious  a  delusion  that  it  is 
scarcely  necessary  to  more  than  refer  to  it,  as  it 
would  apply  equally  logically  to  the  number  of 
doctors,  of  lawyers,  of  policemen,  of  spectacles  that 
are  worn,  of  baths,  of  sewers,  and  in  fact  of  all  the 
developments  of  civilization.  It  is  now  universally 
proven  that  the  civilized  man  is  healthier,  longer 
lived,  bigger,  more  law-abiding,  less  criminal, 
cleaner,  and  in  every  way  better  than  he  was  even 
a  hundred  or  two  hundred  years  ago.  Dentists 
and  doctors  are  now  devoting  fully  one  third  of  their 
time  to  the  protection  and  improvement  of  human 
health  and  life,  and  it  will  not  be  long  before  they 
are  devoting  the  majority  of  their  time  to  this 
purpose  instead  of  mere  cure  or  repair.  As  to  the 
idea  that  dentists  are  in  any  sense  a  modern  inven- 
tion, there  could  be  few  things  more  ludicrous 


OUR  IVORY  KEEPERS  OF  THE  GATE   115 

Almost  every  race  which  has  risen  above  the  level 
of  barbarism,  and  many  still  in  stages  of  savagery, 
have  more  or  less  crude  methods  of  repairing  or  sub- 
stituting teeth.  Fillings  of  various  kinds  of  metal, 
pegs  of  ivory  and  of  bone  are  to  be  found  in  the 
teeth  of  barbarous  races  from  almost  the  very  dawn 
of  history,  while  all  the  civilizations  of  antiquity 
had  quite  elaborate  and  successful  systems  of  den- 
tistry, both  extractive  and  constructive.  Further- 
more, the  traditions  of  all  the  savage  tribes  are  full 
of  references  to  various  diseases  of  the  teeth.  Long- 
fellow, in  his  ballad  of  "Mog  Megone,"  asks  the 
question: 

And  is  the  Sachem  angry  with  Ruth 
Because  she  cries  with  a  pain  in  her  tooth, 
Which  would  make  a  Sagamore  jump  and  cry, 
And  look  about  with  a  woman's  eye? 

With  a  foot-note  to  the  effect,  that,  stoical  as  the 
Indian  was  in  the  endurance  of  pain,  and  high  as  a 
point  of  pride  as  he  placed  it  not  to  display  any  signs 
of  such,  the  one  exception  was  pain  of  the  toothache. 
The  warrior  of  renown  might  be  permitted  to  wince 
and  even  cry  out  loud,  under  this  agony,  without 
losing  his  reputation  for  manliness  and  courage. 

A  similar  set  of  misconceptions  is  found  to  underlie 
two  other  popular  beliefs  on  this  question:  That 
the  diseases  of  the  teeth  are  peculiarly  the  diseases 
of  civilization,  because  they  occur  chiefly  in  the 
upper  or  wealthier  classes  of  the  community;  and 


n6  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

that  American  teeth  are  peculiarly  subject  to  decay, 
as  compared  with  those  of  the  European  nations. 
Ever  since  dental  clinics  began  to  be  established  in 
connection  with  our  hospitals  and  dental  schools, 
for  the  free  treatment  of  diseased  conditions  of  the 
teeth,  it  has  been  abundantly  demonstrated  that 
these  conditions  are  not  only  no  less  frequent  among 
the  lower  or  poorer  classes  than  the  higher,  but 
that  they  are  even  more  so,  on  account  of  the  poor 
food,  bad  housing  and  utter  lack  of  hygienic  care 
of  the  mouth. 

Our  ignorance  of  the  diseases  of  the  savage  and 
of  the  slum  dweller  was,  up  to  twenty  or  thirty  years 
ago,  almost  equally  profound  and  complete.  As 
to  the  badness  of  American  teeth,  it  is  true  that  there 
are  far  fewer  dentists  in  Europe  per  thousand  of 
the  population,  and  that  fewer  people  there  wear 
artificial  teeth,  but  this  is  simply  due  to  the  higher 
standards  of  efficiency  and  perfection  of  our  dental 
apparatus  demanded  on  this  side  of  the  Atlantic. 
Men  and  women  of  abundant  means  and  good 
social  position  can  be  seen  daily  on  the  other 
side  of  the  Atlantic,  going  about  with  a  mouthful  of 
teeth  that  an  American  hired  girl  wouldn't  put  up 
with. 

So  that,  after  a  careful  review  of  all  the  evidence 
pro  and  con,  we  are,  I  think,  justified  in  the  consoling 
assurance  that  the  civilized  child,  our  child,  starts 
out  in  life  with  as  good  a  set  of  chewing  tools  as  any 


OUR  IVORY  KEEPERS  OF  THE  GATE   117 

other  species  of  animal,  or  any  other  race  or  con- 
dition of  men  in  the  world. 

The  problem  is  how  to  preserve  his  birthright. 
The  first  thing  to  be  remembered  is  that  it  isn't 
necessary  to  assist  the  teeth  in  any  way.  All  that 
they  require  is  a  fair  field  and  no  favours,  and  a 
chance  to  help  themselves.  They  will  sprout 
through  the  gums  as  irresistibly  and  inevitably  at  the 
proper  period  as  the  blade  of  grass  will  push  its 
way  up  through  the  soil  in  the  spring.  There  is  a 
story  of  an  individual  who  had  had  many  ad- 
ventures with  wild  animals  in  strange  countries, 
and  had  been  lionized  until  he  was  rather  sick  of  it. 
His  most  admired  feat  was  an  imitation  of  the  cries 
of  the  different  wild  animals  that  he  had  met.  And 
almost  everywhere  he  was  invited  he  was  sure, 
sooner  or  later,  to  be  called  upon  for  this  imitation. 
Being  naturally  a  modest  man,  he  tried  to  get  out  of 
this  display  in  every  way  possible,  but,  finding  his 
protests  of  no  avail,  he  hit  upon  a  plan  to  end 
this  buffoonery  by  diplomatic  means. 

At  a  largely  attended  social  function,  of  which  he 
was  literally  the  "lion"  in  more  senses  than  one,  at 
an  appropriate  time  in  the  proceedings  his  hostess 
begged  him  as  a  special  favour  to  give  one  of  his 
superb  imitations  of  the  wild  animals  at  night. 
He  consented  with  suspicious  promptness,  and  began 
with  the  hooting  of  the  owl.  This  was  wonderfully 
realistic  and  much  applauded.  The  scream  of  the 


n8  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

panther.  This  made  several  of  the  ladies  in  the  audi- 
ence shudder.  The  roar  of  the  lion,  a  thunderous 
volume  of  sound  that  sent  the  small  children 
scuttling  to  hide  their  heads  in  their  mothers' 
dresses.  Then  the  noise  of  the  grass  growing  —  an 
even  more  thunderous  roar. 

In  a  perfectly  healthy  child,  the  teeth  will  produce 
just  about  as  much  pain  as  the  grass  will  make  noise 
in  growing.  If  he  has  any  trouble  with  them  at  all, 
or  even  becomes  aware,  or  makes  his  mother  or 
nurse  aware,  that  he  is  cutting  them,  except  by  the 
sight  of  their  ivory  gleam  as  they  appear  through 
the  gum,  it  is  either  because  his  digestion  is  in  bad 
condition  from  improper  food,  or  he  is  suffering  from 
some  mild  infection,  or  because  he  has  bruised  his 
gums  upon  the  ridiculous  objects  of  stony  hardness, 
like  ivory,  coral,  etc.,  which  he  has  been  given  to 
"cut  his  little  tussy-pegs  on."  Most  of  the  disturb- 
ances of  digestion,  the  rashes,  fretfulness  and 
broken  sleep,  which  are  attributed  so  confidently  by 
Sarah  Gamp  and  her  descendants  to  teething,  are 
due  to  errors  in  diet,  to  the  various  kinds  of  solid 
food  which  the  child  is  just  beginning  to  display  an 
appetite  for;  to  irritation  from  the  filthy  and 
often  infected  fingers  which  are  thrust  into  his 
defenceless  mouth,  to  see  if  the  teeth  are  coming 
through,  or  to  the  slight  infectious  diseases, 
colds,  etc.,  which  he  begins  now  to  be  peculiarly 
liable  to. 


OUR  IVORY  KEEPERS  OF  THE  GATE   119 

The  best  remedy  is  the  proper  regulation  of  his 
diet  and  bowels  by  competent  advice,  letting  his 
gums  and  mouth  severely  alone,  except  to  allow  plenty 
of  cool,  pure  water  and  a  proper  supply  of  food  that 
contains  elements  upon  which  he  can  give  his  jaws 
the  exercise  they  are  beginning  to  crave.  The 
effects  of  teething-rings,  corals,  "comforters,"  and 
all  artificial  objects  on  which  the  gums  are  to  be 
exercised  and  the  teeth  to  be  cut,  are  almost  ex- 
clusively bad.  If  they  are  hard,  they  bruise  and 
injure  the  delicate  gums  of  the  child.  Whether 
hard  or  soft,  they  get  him  into  the  bad  habit  of 
perpetually  wanting  to  have  something  in  his  mouth 
to  mumble  or  chew  at.  They  are  continually  being 
dropped  on  the  floor,  used  to  curry  the  dog  and 
stroke  the  cat,  smeared  over  everything  that  comes 
within  reach,  and  then  thrust  promptly  back  to  the 
mouth  again.  As  germ  collectors,  they  have  few 
equals,  and  no  superiors.  Let  the  child  get  the 
exercise  for  his  jaws  which  he  begins  to  crave  eagerly 
at  this  time,  from  tough  and  resisting  articles  of 
food,  such  as  crusts,  pieces  of  tough  meat,  or  meat 
gristle,  which  are  too  large  for  him  to  swallow;  or  the 
round  end  of  a  chicken  or  mutton  bone,  with  some 
fragments  of  meat  attaching  to  it.  All  of  these  are 
entirely  free  from  objection  on  the  grounds  of  in- 
digestibility,  since  meat  in  all  its  forms  can  be 
digested  by  the  infant's  stomach  from  the  earliest 
stages,  being  simply  another  form  of  milk.  And  the 


120  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

starch  in  the  crust  of  bread  has  already  been 
dextrinized  by  the  heat. 

Supposing  that  the  child  has  been  placed  upon  the 
proper  diet,  both  as  to  balance  of  different  food 
elements,  and  as  to  offering  the  proper  amounts  of 
exercise  to  his  gums  and  budding  teeth,  and  guarded 
as  far  as  may  be  against  putting  filthy  or  infected 
objects  into  his  mouth,  the  next  most  important 
consideration  is  to  keep  his  nostrils  clear  of  ob- 
struction, so  as  to  prevent  his  becoming  a  mouth 
breather. 

Colds  and  snufHes  in  a  child  should  always  be 
treated  by  competent  hands.  If  this  be  thoroughly 
done,  there  will  be  far  less  likelihood  of  his  develop- 
ing post-nasal  growths,  or  adenoids.  These  latter 
growths  are  far  the  commonest  cause  of  deformities 
of  the  jaw,  irregularities  of  the  teeth,  and  disturb- 
ance of  proper  masticating  relations  between  the 
upper  and  lower  jaws.  Further  than  this,  by  caus- 
ing the  child  to  breathe  through  the  mouth  they  put 
the  mucous  membrane  of  the  lips  and  the  gums  in  a 
much  more  exposed  condition,  so  that  an  irritated 
and  congested  condition  of  it  is  readily  produced, 
while  at  the  same  time  it  is  much  more  exposed  to 
the  attack  of  infectious  germs  and  all  the  various 
filth  bacteria. 

If  your  child  shows  any  signs  of  wanting  to  breathe 
through  the  mouth,  or  to  suck  his  thumb,  or  to  get 
the  corner  of  the  blanket  or  the  sheet  into  his  mouth 


OUR  IVORY  KEEPERS  OF  THE  GATE   121 

at  night,  by  all  means  have  him  examined  by  a 
competent  dentist  or  physician,  or  both,  to  see  if  his 
nasal  passages  are  obstructed.  If  this  obstruction 
be  not  removed,  narrowing  of  the  arch  of  the  jaw, 
and  disturbances  of  the  alignment  of  the  teeth  are 
almost  sure  to  follow. 

Next  in  order  is  the  proper  toilet  of  the  mouth. 
This  should  begin  long  before  the  teeth  appear, 
in  a  thorough  washing  out  of  the  mouth  with  cool 
water,  to  which  has  been  added  a  little  mild  local 
antiseptic  or  a  little  soda,  after  each  nursing, 
and  later,  after  each  meal.  Then  when  the  teeth 
come,  they  should  be  systematically  brushed  after 
each  meal,  with  a  small  soft  brush.  As  soon  as 
any  considerable  number  have  appeared,  so  that 
serious  chewing  of  the  food  can  be  carried  out,  it  is 
advisable  to  brush  not  merely  the  teeth,  but  the 
gums  as  well.  And  this  becomes  more  and  more 
important  as  the  age  advances.  The  one  disad- 
vantage at  which  our  teeth  are  placed  under  civili- 
zation, is  that  so  much  work  usually  performed  by 
them  in  cutting  into  bits,  tearing  and  grinding  the 
food,  is  now  carried  out  in  the  kitchen  and  in  the  mill. 

Oddly  enough,  it  is  not  the  most  exposed  part  of 
the  teeth  which  is  their  weakest  point.  The  crown, 
or  visible  portions  which  do  practically  all  the  work 
of  biting,  grinding,  etc.,  have  been  insured  against 
damage  these  millions  of  years  past  by  a  coating  of 
enamel,  or  animal  glass.  This  is  one  of  the  toughest 


122  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

and  most  resisting  substances  in  nature,  being  ab- 
solutely unaffected  by  any  acids  except  those  which 
will  etch  upon  glass,  and  harder  than  any  substances 
with  which  it  is  normally  brought  in  contact,  so  that 
it  will  be  chipped  or  scratched  by  nothing  short  of 
steel,  or  pieces  of  grit.  The  point  where  our  teeth 
begin  to  decay  is  not  where  they  are  hardest  worked, 
on  their  grinding  or  cutting  surfaces,  but  below 
these,  just  where  the  edges  of  the  gums  touch  them, 
at  what  is  known  as  the  "neck"  of  the  tooth.  Here 
is  the  weak  spot,  like  the  well-known  one  on  the 
hull  of  the  battle  ship,  between  wind  and  water, 
where  the  armoured  coating  of  the  enamel  no  longer 
protects,  nor  does  the  bony  socket  of  the  gum  reach 
up  far  enough  to  cover  it.  The  other  weak  spots 
are  the  adjacent  surfaces  of  the  teeth  where  food 
debris  can  accumulate  between  them  and  the  bot- 
toms of  the  grooves  on  their  grinding  surfaces.  The 
spots,  in  fact,  where  neither  food,  cheeks  nor  tongue 
can  rub  and  burnish  them. 

One  of  the  chief  problems  of  modern  preventive 
dentistry  is  to  keep  this  lining  margin  of  the  gum 
both  healthy  and  firmly  and  closely  applied  to  the 
necks  of  the  teeth.  This  process  is  largely  brought 
about  in  animals  by  the  coarseness  and  hardness  of 
the  food  which  they  masticate,  the  tough  leaves 
and  grass  and  grain  of  the  herbivora,  providing  a 
steady  and  constant  massage  of  the  gums,  as  well 
as  the  exercise  for  the  crowns  of  the  teeth  themselves. 


OUR  IVORY  KEEPERS  OF  THE  GATE   123 

In  the  carnivora,  the  gnawing  and  rasping  of  the 
flesh  away  from  the  bones  produces  a  tremendous 
amount  of  pressure  upon,  and  what  looks  like 
really  destructive  violence  to,  the  gum.  This  is 
one  of  the  reasons  why  babies,  kittens  and  young 
lions  and  tigers  in  captivity  will  do  so  badly  if  they 
are  not  well  supplied  with  bones  to  gnaw  at.  But 
where  all  our  starch  food  is  both  ground  and  cooked 
and  much  of  it  reduced  to  a  pulp  before  it  is  put 
into  the  mouth,  and  our  meat  has  its  gristle  trimmed 
off,  its  bones  carefully  cut  out,  and  very  often  its 
fibres  minced  up  into  a  pulp  before  it  is  put  into 
the  mouth  at  all,  it  is  obvious  that  the  chewing  of 
our  food,  even  if  sufficiently  thorough  and  pro- 
longed, can  give  little  or  no  vigorous  stimulation  to 
and  massage  of  the  gums.  To  furnish  this  is  one  of 
the  principal  functions  of  the  tooth  brush.  And 
one  of  the  modern  schools  in  the  dental  profession 
now  declares  that  it  is  even  more  important  to  brush 
the  gums  than  to  brush  the  teeth.  Nor  do  they 
base  it  upon  merely  theoretic  grounds.  They  have 
the  fact  accomplished  to  support  their  conclusion. 
Their  claim  is,  and  they  have  cases  to  prove  it,  that 
a  child  who  has  been  properly  fed  upon  milk  and 
solid  foods  such  as  crusts,  meat,  hard  biscuit,  celery, 
apples,  not  slops  or  puddings,  whose  mouth  has 
been  protected  from  unnecessary  external  infection, 
whose  jaws  have  been  kept  symmetrical  and  well 
developed  by  keeping  the  nasal  passages  clear, 


124  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

can  be  brought  through  the  period  of  the  milk 
teeth,  their  supplanting  by  the  permanent  teeth, 
and  the  complete  development  of  the  latter,  not 
only  without  toothache,  or  gumboil,  but  without 
the  appearance  of  more  than  two  or  three  cavities 
in  even  the  milk  teeth.  Once  launched  in  life  with 
such  a  set  of  teeth  as  this,  our  health  prospects 
are  most  encouraging. 

Having  once  fairly  ushered  the  permanent  teeth 
upon  the  stage  in  good,  workmanlike  condition, 
at  say  fifteen  or  sixteen  years  of  age  (the  so-called 
"wisdom  teeth"  do  not  count,  being  remainders 
left  over  from  a  previous  stage  of  existence,  real 
"intimations  of  immortality"),  an  interesting  prob- 
lem confronts  us:  What  have  we  most  to  dread? 
The  natural  wear  and  tear  of  life  and  inherent 
tendency  to  decay,  or  the  attack  of  disease? 
Here  we  land  in  the  centre  of  a  three-cornered  field 
of  battle  from  which  the  smoke  has  not  yet  suffi- 
ciently lifted  to  enable  us  to  determine  the  issue. 
On  the  one  hand,  we  have  a  minority  of  authorities 
who  declare  that  on  account  of  the  inadequate 
amount  of  work  left  to  be  done  by  the  teeth,  the 
injudicious  diet  of  civilization,  and  the  general 
wear  and  tear  of  our  modern  struggle  for  existence, 
our  teeth  are  doomed  to  decay,  and  carry  the  seeds 
of  their  own  destruction,  as  it  were,  within  them, 
like  the  "original  sin"  of  the  older  theologies. 

This  position,  however,  has  been  pretty  thoroughly 


OUR  IVORY  KEEPERS  OF  THE  GATE   125 

undermined,  as  we  have  already  seen,  except  to 
the  extent  that  it  would  appear  probable  that, 
since  the  average  duration  of  savage  life  was  under 
thirty  years,  and  the  average  longevity  even  of 
civilized  races  has  barely  reached  forty,  nature,  with 
her  wonderful  instinct  for  economy,  is  not  going  to 
waste  time  and  material  in  manufacturing  teeth 
which  will  last  very  much  longer  than  the  time 
for  which  they  are  likely  to  be  wanted.  As  with 
our  eyes,  she  will  allow  a  leeway  of  say  twenty-five 
to  fifty  per  cent.,  and  this  would  carry  us  to  about 
the  forty-fifth  year  as  the  period  beyond  which  we 
have  little  right  to  expect  our  teeth  to  remain  in 
good  working  condition. 

The  question,  however,  is  still  open  to  experiment, 
inasmuch  as  no  considerable  number  of  individuals 
have  yet  been  carried  through  to  that  period  with 
such  scrupulous  toilet  of  the  mouth  as  to  have 
avoided  even  a  majority  of  the  preventable  diseases 
and  injuries  to  the  teeth  and  jaws.  Teeth  that  have, 
been  kept  in  perfect  condition  up  to  say  thirty-five 
years  of  age  will  probably  be  "good  for"  twenty  or 
even  thirty  years  longer.  However,  we  need  not 
be  much  surprised  at  anything  which  happens  to 
our  teeth  after  forty-five  or  fifty  years  of  age,  or 
bear  any  grudge  against  nature  on  that  account. 

This  clears  the  field  for  the  other  two  opposing 
armies  to  fight  out  their  duel.  This  is  hotly  con- 
tested, one  side  holding  that  most  of  the  erosions, 


126  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

cavities  and  inflammations  about  the  roots  of  the 
teeth  and  the  gums  are  local  diseases,  due  to  the 
attack  of  different  disease  germs,  which  can  be  almost 
completely  prevented  by  skilled  local  treatment  and 
strict  attention  to  the  toilet  of  the  mouth  and  asep- 
sis generally.  The  other  side  holds  that,  while 
the  gradual  processes  of  decay,  of  ulceration  and 
of  erosion  are  participated  in  by  bacteria,  diseased 
conditions,  or  lowered  states  of  vitality  of  the  teeth 
and  gums,  due  to  morbid  conditions  of  the  digestion, 
blood  and  general  system  are  the  primary  cause, 
and  enable  bacteria  to  gain  a  foothold  and  do  their 
deadly  work. 

Both  positions  appear  to  have  much  to  support 
them,  and  the  truth,  as  usual,  probably  lies  between 
the  two.  But  at  present  survey,  the  heavier  ar- 
tillery appears  to  be  on  the  side  of  the  localists. 
To  this  extent  both  of  them  agree,  and  it  is  a  good 
basis  of  encouragement  for  those  who  have  teeth  but 
fear  that  they  must  "prepare  to  shed  them  now," 
that  a  very  large  share  of  the  ills  to  which  our  teeth 
are  liable  are  due  to  the  attack  of  definite  and  pre- 
ventable disease.  It  is  not  too  much  to  say  that  by  a 
strict  and  careful  attention  to  the  toilet  of  the  mouth, 
thorough  brushing  and  cleaning  of  the  teeth  after 
each  meal  and  at  bed  time,  including  the  gums  in 
the  sweep  of  the  brush,  and  the  use  of  a  diet  which 
is  not  so  hashed  and  pulped  as  most  of  our  hotel 
and  boarding  house  cooks  seem  to  think  ideal,  as 


OUR  IVORY  KEEPERS  OF  THE  GATE   127 

large  a  share  of  the  various  forms  of  decay  of  the 
teeth  and  ulcerations  of  the  gums  may  be  prevented 
as  modern  sanitary  measures  will  prevent  of  the 
infectious  diseases. 

We  are  rapidly  coming  to  regard  this  local  care 
of  the  teeth  from  another  and  a  somewhat  unex- 
pected point  of  view.  It  has  usually  been  assumed 
that  its  principal  importance  is  in  the  extent  to 
which  it  interferes  with  mastication.  This  is  a 
real  source  of  danger  and,  it  may  be  pointed  out,  is 
one  which  is  caused  quite  as  much  by  painful, 
hollow  and  otherwise  diseased  teeth  as  it  is  by  actual 
loss  of  grinding  and  cutting  surface.  But  fully  as 
important,  in  fact  more  so,  from  the  modern  point 
of  view,  is  the  extent  to  which  these  septic  conditions 
of  the  teeth  not  only  fail  to  add  a  sufficient  amount 
of  saliva  to  the  food  and  carry  out  a  sufficient  amount 
of  grinding  but  actually  poison  and  infect  it.  An 
individual  with  an  ordinary  set  of  bad  and  partly 
carious  teeth  and  spongy  gums,  with  from  one  to 
a  dozen  pus  pockets  in  them,  is  squirting  into  his 
food  at  every  stroke  of  his  jaws  materials  which  are 
as  healthful  and  wholesome  for  the  peace  and  purity 
of  his  alimentary  canal  as  so  much  rattlesnake 
venom.  Fletcherism,  with  bad  teeth,  may  mean 
the  addition  of  some  ten  thousand  germs  per  chew. 
And  prolonged  mastication  with  bad  teeth  can  hardly 
be  regarded  as  an  unmixed  blessing.  When  we 
further  remember  that  Miller  of  Berlin,  in  his  pains- 


128  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

taking  study  of  the  bacteria  of  the  mouth,  isolated 
some  forty  different  species,  each  of  them  counting 
its  billions,  which  normally  inhabited  the  human 
mouth,  and  that  this  includes  several  germs  of 
putrefaction,  half  a  dozen  different  kinds  of  ferments, 
two  or  three  staphylococci,  and  not  infrequently  two 
or  three  of  the  streptococci,  the  germs  of  suppuration 
and  blood  poisoning,  while  in  about  ten  per  cent,  of 
the  mouths  examined  in  the  winter  time,  the  pneu- 
monia germ  is  to  be  identified,  and  in  a  smaller 
percentage,  a  germ  which  can  scarcely  be  distin- 
guished from  diphtheria,  it  will  be  seen  what  a  really 
vital  problem  it  is  to  keep  the  portal  of  our  ali- 
mentary canal  in  as  nearly  a  healthful  and  surgically 
clean  condition  as  possible.  Many  of  the  inhal- 
ation pneumonias,  which  follow  the  administration 
of  ether  or  chloroform,  are  now  believed  to  be  due 
to  the  swarms  of  germs  drawn  into  the  patients' 
lungs  from  the  cavities  of  the  teeth,  and  the  pockets 
of  the  gums.  Not  only  so,  but  several  of  our  most 
serious  diseases  of  the  alimentary  canal  and  of 
the  blood,  notably  the  so-called  "pernicious  anemia," 
are  now  regarded  by  eminent  authorities  as  caused 
by  germs  whose  original  landing  place  and  foothold 
in  the  body  are  obtained  in  the  mouth  and  gums. 

The  pious  men  of  old,  who  advised  us  to  "Keep 
thy  mouth  with  diligence,  for  out  of  it  are  the  issues 
of  life,"  might  have  added  to  it  —  "and  of  death." 

Many    chronic  dyspepsias  and  persistent  bowel 


OUR  IVORY  KEEPERS  OF  THE  GATE    129 

troubles,  mysterious  and  obstinate  anemias,  to  say 
nothing  of  chronic  rheumatism  and  gout  are  kept 
up  by  perpetual  self-infection  of  the  stomach  and 
intestines  by  the  foul  and  septic  discharges  of  de- 
caying teeth  and  ulcerated  gums.  We  are  even 
coming  to  suspect  that  some  of  our  obstinate 
chronic  bronchitises  and  winter  coughs,  with  pro- 
fuse and  foul-smelling  expectorations  are  due  to 
the  inhalation  of  sprays  of  these  same  germs  in  the 
paroxysms  of  coughing. 

It  is  impossible  to  keep  the  teeth  and  gums  too 
clean  and  sweet,  both  for  their  own  sake  and  that 
of  the  rest  of  the  system.  Even  if  by  so  doing  we 
cannot  hope  entirely  to  prevent  their  wearing  away 
and  decay,  yet  all  that  we  do  succeed  in  accomplish- 
ing is  to  the  good  from  every  point  of  view. 

As  to  the  effect  of  conditions  of  the  general  health 
upon  the  teeth,  the  problem  is  a  more  difficult  one. 
There  is,  of  course,  no  doubt  whatever  that  various 
diseases  of  the  general  system  express  themselves 
in  the  mouth  and  gums.  For  instance,  in  anemia, 
or  general  deterioration  of  the  blood,  the  gums  be- 
come pale,  spongy  and  inclined  to  bleed  readily. 
In  lead  poisoning,  they  become  congested  and  swol- 
len and  a  bluish  line,  due  to  the  deposition  of  sul- 
phide of  lead,  is  formed  along  their  margins  at  the 
point  where  they  touch  at  the  roots  of  the  teeth. 
In  children  who  are  fed  too  exclusively  upon  ar- 
tificial and  pasteurized  foods,  the  gums  become 


i3o  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

spongy,  pale,  purplish  in  spots,  bleed  readily,  and 
such  teeth  as  are  present  become  loosened  in  the 
condition  known  as  "scurvy,"  which  used  to  be 
the  plague  of  navies  and  sailors  upon  long  voyages, 
until  a  thoroughly  balanced  diet  with  plenty  of 
fresh  fruits  and  fresh  vegetables  was  substituted 
for  the  half  decayed  "salt  horse"  and  hardtack  diet. 

Those  individuals  who  are  subject  to  gouty  symp- 
toms and  attacks  are  very  apt  to  have  a  peculiar 
disease  of  the  gums  and  alveoli,  characterized 
by  suppuration  about  and  in  the  roots  of  the  teeth, 
with  sinking  and  recession  of  the  gums,  with  ulti- 
mate loosening  and  loss  of  the  teeth  involved.  This 
is  known  as  "Riggs'  Disease"  or  by  the  appalling 
term  of  Pyorrhos  alveolar  is;  though  this  and  its 
pus  absorption  probably  cause  their  gout,  quite 
as  much  as  their  gout  causes  it. 

In  short,  it  is  becoming  more  and  more  necessary 
for  the  dentist  to  be  a  general  pathologist  and  a 
trained  physician,  specializing  in  the  diseases  of  the 
teeth;  and,  on  the  other  hand,  for  the  physician  to 
have  some  adequate  knowledge  of  broader  aspects 
of  the  problems  of  dentistry  and  of  the  hygiene  and 
pathology  of  the  mouth. 

As  to  the  direct  influence  of  special  diet,  or  par- 
ticular food  for  the  teeth,  there  is  war  of  the  fiercest 
and  hottest  upon  every  hand.  One  school,  both  of 
physicians  and  dentists,  even  declares  that  all  the 
processes  of  the  decay  of  the  teeth  and  of  the  sup- 


OUR  IVORY  KEEPERS  OF  THE  GATE   131 

puration  and  ulceration  of  the  gums  are  due  at 
bottom,  to  the  outrageous  overfeeding  of  our  civi- 
lized diet,  with  the  consequent  production  of  uric 
acid  and  all  its  tribe.  From,  the  other  extreme  there 
comes  the  declaration  that  diet  as  such,  or  particular 
articles  of  food  as  such,  have  no  effect  whatever 
upon  the  teeth,  except  in  so  far  as  they  may  keep 
up  or  lower  the  general  nutrition  and  vigour  of  the 
tissues,  or  produce  disturbances  of  the  digestion 
which  will  secondarily  affect  the  teeth  along  with 
other  organs  of  the  body.  The  mass,  however,  of 
thoughtful  practitioners  of  both  dentistry  and 
physicians,  are  inclined  to  take  a  middle  ground. 
First  of  all,  that  the  direct  effect  of  the  different  kinds 
of  food  upon  the  teeth  is  comparatively  slight, 
such  influence  as  they  may  have  being  largely  due 
to  the  fermentations  which  remnants  left  between 
the  teeth  or  in  hollows  of  the  teeth,  may  favour  or 
set  up.  From  this  point  of  view,  meat  is  less  dan- 
gerous than  either  the  starches  or  the  sugars,  inas- 
much as  the  bacteria  which  can  thrive  in  meat,  set 
up  for  the  most  part  alkaline  fermentations  which 
do  not  attack  either  teeth  or  gums.  On  the  other 
hand,  starchy  or  sugary  debris  left  in  the  teeth, 
set  up  very  promptly  highly  acid  fermentations, 
which  freely  attack  any  exposed  surfaces  of  the 
teeth. 

For  practical  purposes,  nowever  this  difference 
may  be  disregarded,   for  the   reason  that  neither 


132  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

starches  nor  meats  should  be  allowed  to  remain 
lodged  between  the  teeth.  Practically  all  food  debris 
should  be  vigorously  brushed  out  or  sawed  out  with 
dental  silk,  or  with  light  touches  of  the  toothpick 
after  each  meal,  or  by  finishing  each  meal  with  a 
crust  of  bread,  hard  biscuit,  stalk  of  celery  or  an 
apple,  which  clean  the  teeth  better  than  a  careless 
brushing.  Secondly,  they  are  practically  in  accord 
upon  the  ground  that  the  effect  of  a  particular  diet 
upon  the  teeth  is  very  largely  due  to  the  effect 
upon  the  general  nutrition  and  digestion  of  the 
individual  and  the  exercise  it  gives  the  teeth. 
Broadly  speaking,  then,  we  come  back  to  a  clear 
and  common  sense  ground :  Eat  plenty  of  such  food 
as  best  agrees  with  you,  to  be  determined  by  your 
own  experience  and  the  advice  of  your  family 
physician.  Include  such  materials  as  parched 
grains,  nuts,  unpulped  and  unhashed  meats,  salad 
vegetables,  like  celery,  etc.,  as  will  give  the  teeth 
plenty  of  exercise.  Chew  it  thoroughly,  but  not 
to  excess,  and  do  not  for  a  moment  imagine  that 
by  so  doing  you  can  gain  any  magic,  life-giving 
property,  or  increase  its  nutritive  value  more  than 
a  fraction  of  a  per  cent. 

Lastly,  see  that  your  mouth  is  surgically,  scrup- 
ulously, aseptically  clean,  as  nearly  as  it  is  possible, 
at  least  four  times  a  day. 


CHAPTER  VII 
THE  CHILD'S  SELF-RESPECT 

THE  child  is  born  an  egoist.  If  he  was  not, 
he  would  never  survive.  He  is  absolutely 
compelled  to  devote  his  entire  time  and 
attention  to  the  business  of  growing  up  —  in  other 
words,  to  himself.  But  there  is  nothing  small  about 
this  egoism.  It  includes  the  whole  world  in  its 
scope  —  because  he  believes  himself  to  be  It. 
Everything  is,  or  is  not,  according  as  it  touches  or 
doesn't  touch  him.  He  has  no  conception  of 
anything  outside  of  himself. 

Emerson  simply  reverted  to  first  principles,  to 
the  everlasting  childhood,  when  he  said,  "I  am 
the  Cosmos,  the  Universe."  The  child  would  say 
it  if  he  could  talk,  or  were  conscious  of  it. 

Naturally  this  makes  him  a  trifle  selfish,  in  the 
sense  of  self-centred.  He  doesn't  as  yet  know  of 
anything  else  to  centre  about.  How  can  we  possi- 
bly expect  him  to  recognize  the  rights  or  interests 
of  individuals  whose  very  existence  he  cannot  yet 
conceive  of?  To  the  child  under  three,  his  devoted 
parents,  his  nurse,  his  playmates,  are  little  more 
than  so  many  features  of  the  landscape.  It  no  more 

133 


134  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

occurs  to  him  to  consider  their  rights  or  feelings, 
than  it  does  to  us  grown-ups  to  allow  the  political 
rights  of  stumps  or  the  fine  feelings  of  sidewalks 
to  enter  into  our  calculations.  His  business  is  to 
grow  at  the  expense  of  his  surroundings,  regardless 
of  their  feelings.  If  he  doesn't,  he  is  not  healthy, 
and  will  never  live  to  grow  up.  In  other  words, 
the  child  is  simply  provided  by  wise  Mother  Nature 
with  those  particular  instincts  and  impulses,  moral 
and  mental  as  well  as  physical,  which  are  needed  to 
carry  him  through  that  particular  stage  of  his  growth. 
When  he  reaches  the  stage  where  other  and  broader 
instincts  are  needed,  these  also  will  develop. 

Egoism,  "selfishness,"  if  you  like,  comes  first. 
Altruism,  unselfishness,  later,  but  just  as  inevi- 
tably. It  is  the  failure  to  recognize  this  latter  fact, 
and  the  attempt  to  inculcate  kindness,  gratitude, 
self-denial  at  the  time  when  they  are  not  only 
unnecessary  but  unnatural  that  has  made  the  tragedy 
of  the  moral  training  of  many  a  child.  If  a  child 
wants  to  give  up  its  own  way,  and  begins  to  worry 
about  his  little  sins  of  omission  and  commission 
before  eight  or  ten  years  of  age,  and  usually  up  to 
twelve  or  fifteen,  there  is  something  wrong  with 
him.  Take  him  to  a  doctor. 

The  abnormally  and  precociously  "good"  chil- 
dren who  weep  over  the  sins  of  their  parents,  and 
pray  for  their  little  playmates,  inevitably  die  young 
and  go  to  heaven  in  the  "goody-good"  books.  This 


THE  CHILD'S  SELF-RESPECT  135 

is  one  point  in  which  Sunday-school  literature  is 
true  to  real  life.  The  failure  to  recognize  the 
absolute  necessity,  in  the  broad  sense,  the  Tightness 
and  the  morality  of  primary  selfishness  or  absorp- 
tion in  self,  has  been  the  source  of  half  our  misun- 
derstandings of  the  morality  of  the  child.  He  is 
no  simple  little  mass  of  clay  or  putty,  for  his  teachers 
and  parents  to  mould  into  any  shape  at  their  own 
sweet  will.  He  is  a  sturdy,  vigorous,  growing  shoot, 
with  perfectly  definite  growth  tendencies,  which 
you  cross  at  your  peril,  with  a  will  of  his  own,  and 
a  definite  goal  toward  which  this  tendency  will 
carry  him,  which  may  even  reach  the  level  of  that 
pinnacle  of  perfection,  yourself,  if  you  will  only 
let  him  alone  and  not  interfere  with  him  too 
much. 

The  child  is  selfish  —  yes,  but  so  is  a  lily  shoot 
green.  It  ought  to  show  some  little  trace  or  tint 
of  white  about  it  if  it  is  going  in  a  few  short  weeks  to 
blossom  out  in  the  spotless  purity  of  Easter.  But 
it  doesn't.  Yet,  cut  down  into  the  heart  of  it,  and 
there  you  will  find  folded  and  packed  away  with  the 
most  exquisite  skill,  every  petal,  every  sepal,  every 
detail  of  that  fragrant  snowy  bell  that  thrills  our 
senses  like  a  call  from  another  world.  You  will 
have  to  take  a  microscope  to  find  some  of  the 
details,  but  they  are  all  there.  Yet  when  the  spear 
first  pushes  up  through  the  earth,  you  could  hardly 
tell  it  from  a  head  of  asparagus. 


i36  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

The  blossom  of  the  lily  is  for  the  continuance  of 
the  race,  for  the  welfare  of  future  generations. 
That  blossom  of  human  character  which  we  call 
the  higher  morality,  unselfishness,  charity,  is  for 
the  same  ends  and  will  appear,  or  attempt  to  appear, 
as  inevitably  at  its  appropriate  time.  To  expect 
to  find  it  full  grown,  or  even  visible  in  the  bud,  at 
a  time  of  life  when  every  energy  is  and  must  be 
concentrated  upon  the  preservation  and  develop- 
ment of  self  is  not  only  irrational  but  absurd. 

We  do  not  expect  paternal  feelings  in  a  child  of 
five.  Why,  then,  should  we  expect  any  other  of 
those  race-regarding-impulses  which  we  term  "moral- 
ity!" Even  to  appeal  to  the  "better  feelings"  of  a 
child  of  eight  or  ten,  is  often  almost  as  irrational 
as  the  celebrated  apostrophe  of  the  emotional 
Irish  barrister,  who  in  the  fine  frenzy  of  the  pero- 
ration of  his  plea  for  leniency  on  account  of 
the  gray-haired  mother  of  the  prisoner  at  the 
bar  whirled  on  the  Judge  with  the  thrilling  appeal: 

"Sirr!  was  you  iver  a  mother!"  To  appeal  to  a 
child's  better  nature,  while  excellent  in  moderation, 
does  little  more  than  make  a  hypocrite  out  of  him 
before  his  time.  It  is  hard  to  get  away  from  the 
idea  that,  because  the  child  will  need  these  altruis- 
tic qualities  later  in  life,  they  must  be  present  at  the 
very  earliest  stage  of  his  existence  "in  the  germ" 
in  such  a  way  that  they  can  be  reached  and  stimu- 
lated, and  directly  caused  to  develop.  In  nine 


THE  CHILD'S  SELF-RESPECT  137 

cases  out  of  ten,  they  are  as  far  beyond  the  possibility 
of  direct  interference  as  the  germ,  of  the  lily  flower 
in  the  heart  of  its  stalk.  The  only  way  that  they 
can  be  stimulated  to  develop  is  by  giving  them  a 
favourable  environment.  Give  the  soil  plenty  of 
nourishment  and  see  that  the  sunshine  and  the  rain 
have  free  access.  Most  of  our  (in  the  vernacular 
term)  "previous"  methods  of  inculcating  morality 
and  developing  unselfishness,  conscientiousness  and 
self-denial  in  children  are  about  as  rational  as  picking 
the  petals  of  the  unfolding  bud  open  with  a  pin,  or 
injecting  "plant-foods"  into  its  heart  with  a  hypo- 
dermic needle. 

He  has  got  your  hair,  and  his  mother's  eyes  and 
voice,  and  some  of  your  little  tricks  of  manner  — 
and  temper  —  now,  and  he  is  just  as  safe  to  develop 
your  superb  self-control  and  civic  devotion  and 
consideration  for  others,  if  you  will  only  give  him 
time  and  set  him  a  good  example.  Meanwhile, 
preaching  to  him  that  he  should  possess  these  quali- 
ties, will  expedite  matters  precious  little,  and,  if  not 
backed  up  by  example,  not  at  all.  Remember  that 
life  and  growth  of  all  sorts  are  but  a  response  to 
environment,  and  new  responses  can  only  occur  as 
opportunity  is  afforded  for  them. 

"But,"  says  some  one,  "the  child  is  born  into 
precisely  the  environment  in  which  he  will  grow  up, 
which  will  surround  him  in  his  adult  life.  He  is 
born  into  this  twentieth  century,  where  he  will 


138  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

continue  to  live. "  That  is  precisely  where  we  mis- 
judge. The  child  is  not  born  into  the  twentieth 
century,  but  in  the  fortieth  century  B.  C.  He 
begins  just  where  the  race  did,  and  he  climbs  every 
inch  of  his  family  tree  from  the  grass  up  to  the 
topmost  branches.  If  we  hope  for  any  intelligent 
understanding  of  his  little  problems,  if  we  are  to  get 
any  sympathetic  insight  into  his  little  heart,  he  must 
be  regarded  first  as  a  kitten,  then  as  a  monkey, 
next  as  a  little  savage  —  all  but  the  war-paint; 
then  as  a  mixture  of  knight  errant  and  free-booter; 
and  last  of  all  the  sober  citizen  of  a  republic. 

He  is  equally  charming  and  delightful  in  eacn  of 
these  stages,  except  perhaps  the  last.  What  is  most 
vital  of  all  is  that  each  one  of  them  is  the  necessary 
precursor  of  the  next.  Check  the  irrepressive  activ- 
ity, utter  irresponsibility,  the  merry  enjoyment 
and  delight,  the  sublime  and  unconscious  sel- 
fishness of  the  kitten  stage,  and  you  stunt  the 
possibilities  of  development  of  the  later  citizen  and 
patriot. 

The  child  lives  in  a  world  of  his  own,  half  real, 
half  imaginary.  And  if  we  would  recognize  this, 
and  try  to  see  things  from  his  point  of  view,  we  would 
save  ourselves  a  world  of  unnecessary  worriment,  and 
many  a  heartache.  Just  so  surely  as  the  child  is 
wholesomely  and  unconsciously  selfish  during  his 
first  five  years,  will  he  develop  the  germs  of  unself- 
ishness in  his  third  five  years,  under  anything  like 


THE  CHILD'S  SELF-RESPECT  139 

reasonable  surroundings.  And  all  our  proddings 
and  preachings  and  scoldings  will  not  hasten  the 
process  a  particle,  but  will  infinitely  bewilder  him 
—  poor  little  chap ! 

Having  dispassionately  recognized  in  the  dry, 
white  light  of  science  the  primary  and  essential 
selfishness  of  the  child,  the  next  step  is  to  recognize 
our  own.  This  is  often  just  as  unconscious,  and  just 
as  colossal.  We  are  immensely  proud  of  and 
devoted  to  this  little  morsel  of  the  "bone  of  our 
bone  and  the  flesh  of  our  flesh."  There  is  nothing 
that  we  wouldn't  do  for  him  —  except  let  him  live 
his  own  life.  We  lay  wonderful  plans  for  his  future. 
We  are  going  to  make  such  and  such  things  out  of 
him.  He  is  to  carry  out  the  plans  which  we  had 
dreamed  of  for  ourselves,  but  now  despair  of  accom- 
plishing. A  nice,  cheerful  encouraging  prospect 
for  the  poor  little  tot,  to  begin  with!  And  then  be- 
cause the  poor  youngster  begins  to  show  definite  life 
and  growth  tendencies  of  his  own,  which  cross  these 
carefully  laid  plans  of  ours,  we  become  indignant, 
and  there  is  trouble  at  once.  Surely  we,  with  our 
age  and  experience,  must  know  better  than  he  does. 
But  are  we  so  overwhelmingly  sure  of  that?  Have 
we  made  such  a  brilliant  and  indisputable  success  of 
our  life  and  career  at  every  point  that  we  feel  com- 
petent to  take  absolute  and  unchecked  control  of  his? 
How  much  do  we  know  that  we  owe  to  inborn  qual- 
ities which  we  inherited  directly  through  our  parents, 


i4o  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

and  how  much  to  their  formal  teaching  and  train- 
ing? 

What  we  really  reverence  and  love  in  the  memory 
of  our  parents  is  what  they  were  and  what  they  did, 
not  what  they  taught  or  preached.  We  can  see 
now  that  they  were  kindlier  than  their  principles, 
better  than  their  ideals,  and  broader  than  their 
creeds.  If  you  are  worthy  of  your  child's  admiration 
and  imitation  he  will  find  it  out  without  having  to 
be  told  daily  about  it.  If  you  are  not  —  then, 
heaven  help  you !  For  you  can't  hide  that  from  him, 
by  all  the  professions  and  precepts  in  the  world. 

There  is  another  realm  in  which  the  selfishness 
which  we  reprobate  so  severely  and  strive  so  desper- 
ately to  eradicate  is  not  confined  to  the  child.  I  fear 
that  most  of  us,  as  parents,  will  be  forced  remorse- 
fully to  admit,  if  we  search  our  own  souls  deeply 
and  honestly  enough,  that,  mixed  with  our  pride 
and  joy  in  our  children,  intertwined  with  our  most 
unselfish  determination  to  give  them  a  great  future, 
at  no  matter  what  expense  of  labour  or  privation  to 
ourselves,  there  lurks  something  of  a  narrower  sense 
of  ownership,  of  possession,  of  power.  Here  at 
last  is  something  that  really  belongs  to  us,  that  we 
can  do  with  as  we  wish,  and  can  mould  according  to 
our  pleasure.  Here  is  one  human  being  who  at  least 
shall  appreciate  us  at  our  true  worth,  admire 
and  respect  us  as  we  deserve.  Nobody  else  has  ever 
done  it  yet,  but  that's  all  the  more  reason  why  he 


THE  CHILD'S  SELF-RESPECT  141 

should.  Then,  when  this  tiny  piece  of  ourselves, 
this  mannikin  that  we  have  brought  into  existence, 
have  nourished  and  supported,  fails  to  bow  down 
and  worship  us  —  how  bitter  the  disappointment. 

When  he  disobeys  our  formal  command,  when  he 
refuses  to  eat  our  favourite  food,  when  he  flouts 
our  dearest  views  of  life,  how  it  hurts !  Let  us  never 
forget,  though,  that  the  principal  wound  is  to  our 
vanity,  to  our  self-esteem.  Otherwise,  why  should 
we  lose  our  temper  and  punish  and  scold  him,  or, 
what  is  almost  worse  in  its  effect  upon  him  from  sense 
of  proportion  and  judgment,  denounce  him  as  "headed 
for  a  reform  school, "  "sure  to  come  to  some  bad  end, " 
or  to  "bring  down  our  gray  hairs  in  sorrow  to  the 
grave?"  To  make  a  child  believe  that  he  is  a 
criminal  and  a  lost  soul  on  account  of  some  trivial 
act  of  disobedience  is  crueler  and  more  radically 
injurious  in  its  effects  than  a  thrashing. 

I  am  afraid  that  we,  as  parents,  even  the  most 
conscientious,  on  careful  analysis  will  find  ourselves 
compelled  to  confess  that  a  pitifully  large  share  of 
the  demands  for  obedience,  or  the  formal  discipline 
to  which  children  are  subjected  in  their  moral 
training  is  based  upon  the  half  unconscious  demands 
of  our  own  vanity.  People  shall  see  that  our  child 
will  obey  us  promptly,  even  if  no  one  else  in  the 
wide  world  will.  His  bringing-up  shall  be  a  credit  to 
us.  And  our  sole  aim  should  be,  that  it  may  be 
a  credit  to  him. 


142  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

Probably  the  next  charge  that  we  hear  made 
against  the  natural  morality  of  the  child  is  that  he 
is  "ungrateful."  And  to  this  we  frankly  plead 
guilty.  But  why?  Simply  because  he  doesn't 
know  that  he  has  anything  to  be  grateful  for,  short 
of  his  twelfth  or  fifteenth  year.  Nor  is  it  particu- 
larly desirable  that  he  should.  The  young  child 
takes  everything  that  comes  to  him  as  r.  matter  of 
right  and  of  course,  just  as  the  plants  do  the  sunshine 
and  the  rain  and  the  soil  in  which  they  grow.  And 
he  ought  to,  if  he  is  to  be  happy  and  healthy  and 
growing.  We  know  well  what  his  birth  and  his 
upbringing,  his  care  and  his  shelter  have  cost  — 
in  birth  pangs,  in  toil,  in  anxious  care,  in  self-denial. 
But  how  on  earth  can  we  expect  him  to  realize  it? 
Our  conceptions  are  founded  upon  and  absolutely 
limited  by  our  experiences.  Naturally  his  tiny  past 
is  utterly  destitute  of  such  experiences,  or  anything 
approaching  them.  He  has,  in  the  language  of  the 
pedagogists,  no  "apperceptive  basis"  for  the  con- 
ception of  them.  Why  should  we  expect  it  of  him? 

It  never  occurs  to  the  young  child  that  his  food, 
his  clothing,  his  housing,  or  the  furniture  of  his  room 
cost  money,  or  represent  effort.  And  it  is  difficult 
even  to  make  him  believe  that  they  do,  because 
he  never  has  occasion  to  purchase  them  for  himself. 
He  discovers  at  a  very  early  day  that  his  toys  and  his 
sweetmeats  cost  money,  which  if  spent  for  them 
cannot  be  used  for  something  else.  And  for  them 


THE  CHILD'S  SELF-RESPECT  143 

he  will  evince  a  lively  though  rather  evanescent 
gratitude.  But  for  clothes,  for  school-books,  bed- 
ding or  table  linen,  not  a  particle.  His  attitude  is 
shrewdly  illustrated  by  the  remark:  "Don't  give 
me  gloves,  or  a  fur  cap,  or  a  napkin-ring  for  a  birth- 
day present.  I'd  get  them  anyhow. " 

He  is  perfectly  willing  to  love  his  parents,  to  ad- 
mire them  with  an  extravagance  far  beyond  their 
deserts,  to  laugh  at  their  little  jokes  and  favourite 
stories,  to  accede  to  all  of  their  reasonable  and  even 
to  some  unreasonable  requests.  But  to  demand 
that  he  should  be  grateful,  at  least  for  anything 
beyond  "extras"  and  presents,  simply  confuses  and 
puzzles  him.  Not  even  the  favourite  trick  of  com- 
paring his  condition  with  that  of  slum  or  beggar 
children  carries  much  conviction.  He  is  apt  rather 
to  admire  the'adventurousnessand  delightful  freedom 
from  fixed  ties  and  grown-up  interference  generally 
exhibited  in  their  lives,  and  at  bottom  cannot  rid 
himself  of  the  conviction  that  they  really  have  by 
nature  at  least  three  square  meals  a  day  and  a  place 
to  sleep,  except  at  such  times  as  they  are  exhibited 
hungry  and  shelterless  for  his  benefit.  The  naive 
remark  of  a  little  French  princess  when  told  that 
the  peasants  throughout  her  father's  kingdom  were 
starving  to  death  was,  "Why,  how  foolish  of  them! 
I  would  rather  eat  bread  and  cheese  first!"  is 
typical  of  the  instinctive  attitude  of  the  child 
mind.  It  is  inconceivable  to  him  that  any  nice 


144  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

little  boy  or  girl  shouldn't  have  plenty  of  unin- 
teresting plain  things  to  eat.  Scarcity  is  a  thing 
that  he  can  only  conceive  of  in  connection  with 
caramels  and  ice  cream  sodas.  And  I  doubt  if  it 
is  not  wiser  to  let  that  conviction  remain  undisturbed 
until  the  hard  facts  of  experience  dispel  it,  as  they 
will,  all  too  soon. 

Now  that  we  have  frankly  admitted  that  the 
child  is  both  selfish,  ungrateful  and  often  disobedient, 
it  is  time  to  set  down  the  positive  virtues  that  he 
possesses:  In  the  first  place,  he  is  naturally  truth- 
ful; and  his  instinctive  inclination  is  to  relate  the 
event  as  it  happened  to  him  with  the  fidelity  and 
mechanical  accuracy  of  a  reflection  in  the  mirror. 
That  is  what  his  senses  are  for,  to  see,  hear,  feel 
things;  his  memory,  to  store  them  up;  his  language, 
to  reproduce  them  afterward  for  his  own  benefit  and 
that  of  others.  It  is  the  line  not  only  of  instinct,  of 
all  the  impulses  of  past  ages,  but  of  physiological 
least  resistance.  Only  one  thing  can  warp  this 
tendency,  can  divert  this  truth  impulse,  and  that 
is  fear.  Fear,  which,  alas!  we  have  too  often 
ourselves  introduced  into  his  consciousness. 

That  the  child  is  by  nature  irrepressibly  affection- 
ate, loving,  full  of  good  comradeship,  calls  for  no 
proof  to  any  one  who  knows  children.  He  needs 
these  qualities  in  his  business,  just  as  much  as  he  does 
his  selfishness  and  his  aggressiveness.  Millions  of 
years  ago  it  was  found  out  by  our  ancestors,  even 


THE  CHILD'S  SELF-RESPECT  145 

before  they  came  down  from  the  tree  tops,  that  if 
they  would  prosper  they  must  have  their  neighbour's 
consent  in  the  form  of  his  good  will.  Though  they 
hated  their  enemy,  they  must  love  their  neighbour. 
Moreover,  the  time  when  he  needed  these  qualities 
in  the  highest  degree  was  during  the  early  stages  of 
his  individual  existence,  in  the  period  of  infancy. 
Since  the  helpless  infant  has  to  be  taken  care  of,  if 
he  is  to  survive,  it  is  almost  necessary  that  it  should 
be  plump  and  pink  and  cute,  and  have  a  lot  of  en- 
gaging little  tricks  and  manners  about  it.  And  when 
all  is  said  and  done,  nothing  is  more  engaging  and 
attractive,  more  flattering  to  one's  self-love,  than  a 
display  of  spontaneous  affection  on  the  part  of  some 
other  human  being. 

Therefore,  upon  the  coldest  of  evolutionary 
grounds,  it  is  the  business  of  the  child  to  be  affec- 
tionate. Of  course  in  its  earliest  stages  this  affec- 
tionateness  is  like  that  of  the  flower  for  the  sun, 
or  of  a  kitten  for  cream.  But  it  is  a  natural  basis 
for  the  higher  affections,  for  devotion,  for  kindliness, 
and  if  given  anything  like  a  favourable  environment 
and  a  good  example  will  develop  into  all  of  these. 
In  short,  our  virtues  are  hereditary,  older  than  we  are 
as  a  race  in  fact.  Our  vices  are  acquired,  a  product 
of  civilization,  of  education. 

The  one  thing  that  will  make  a  child  a  liar  is 
cowardice  —  fear  of  the  consequences  of  telling  the 
truth.  And  these  consequences,  nine  times  out  of 


146  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

ten,  wnich  he  dreads  are  the  results  of  the  wrath, 
more  or  less  righteous,  of  those  who  are  in  authority 
over  him.  Now  fear  has  unquestionably  played  in 
the  past  a  large  and  important  part  as  one  of  the 
motive  forces  of  moral  growths,  as  one  of  the  in- 
fluences to  be  appealed  to  in  education.  "The  fear 
of  the  Lord  is  the  beginning  of  wisdom, "  we  are  com- 
placently told.  But  necessary  and  inevitable  as 
this  fear  of  the  consequences  is,  in  prompting  self- 
restraint  and  moulding  conduct,  it  is  now  univer- 
sally admitted  by  thoughtful  teachers  and  parents 
that  it  should  be  restricted  to  as  narrow  limits  as 
possible  in  the  training  of  the  young  child.  Cer- 
tainly no  child  should  be  made  so  afraid  of  any  form 
of  punishment  that  he  will  lie  to  escape  it. 

To  the  unspoiled,  uncowed,  unterrified  child  it 
goes  as  much  against  the  grain  to  tell  a  falsehood  as 
it  does  to  eat  salt  on  his  pudding  instead  of  sugar. 
To  invent  something  that  didn't  happen  is  an  un- 
necessary mental  effort,  in  the  first  place.  In  the 
second,  it  lands  him  in  a  lot  of  trouble,  making  this 
new  creation  of  his  square  with  a  lot  of  other  obsti- 
nate facts  that  are  sure  to  crop  up.  In  the  third 
place,  it  leaves  him  in  the  uncomfortable  dread  of 
being  found  out,  when  he  knows  that  with  the 
exquisite  logic  of  parental  discipline  he  will  be 
doubly  punished,  once  for  committing  the  offence 
and  once  more  for  lying  about  it.  Lying  is  the  vice 
of  slaves  and  cowards,  and  your  child  is  born  a 


THE  CHILD'S  SELF-RESPECT  147 

free  man  and  a  fighter.  If  he  loses  his  heritage,  it 
will  be  more  often  your  fault  than  his. 

This  is  not  by  any  means  to  say  that  a  child 
will  not  of  his  own  accord  make  a  statement  which 
doesn't  correspond  with  the  facts.  On  the  contrary, 
many  children  are  born  romancers,  and  positively 
revel  in  exaggeration  and  the  rolling  forth  of  romantic 
adventures  which  could  never  by  any  possibility  have 
occurred  to  them  —  unless  it  be  in  some  previous 
incarnation.  These  little  wonder-mongers  have  such 
fertile  imaginations  and  envisage  things  so  clearly 
that  are  told  to  them,  and  gloat  so  over  the  pictures 
of  battle  and  adventure  which  are  spread  before 
them  in  their  gift  books,  recalling  every  tiniest 
detail  and  touch  of  colour  in  that  photographic 
memory  of  theirs,  that  they  have,  I  am  con- 
vinced, great  difficulty,  when  once  fairly  launched 
in  pouring  forth  their  delighted  memories  of  what 
happened  to  them  in  the  enchanted  wood  at  the 
bottom  of  the  garden,  in  distinguishing  between 
their  memories  of  what  really  happened  to  them 
and  their  even  more  vivid  recollections  of  the  things 
that  they  have  read  or  been  told,  or  seen  in  picture 
books.  The  cow  that  actually  shook  its  head  and 
mooed  ferociously  at  them  is  a  recollection  not  a 
whit  more  real  to  them  than  the  dragon  with  blazing 
scales  and  fiery  breath  who  almost  swallowed  them 
whole  for  supper. 

But.  there  is  .not  a  particle  of  vice  in  these  prepos- 


148  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

terous  romancings,  which  are  obviously  on  the 
very  face  of  them  incapable  of  deceiving  even  the 
most  gullible.  They  furnish  one  of  the  most  de- 
lightful occupations  of  childhood  and,  for  the  matter 
of  that,  of  life  —  and  the  only  harm  in  them  is  in 
the  mild  element  of  boasting  and  braggadocio  in- 
volved, and  the  habit  of  leading  the  child  to  dwell 
too  much  in  the  clouds. 

There  is  little  fear,  however,  but  that  he  will  come 
to  earth  soon  enough.  Their  greatest  power  for 
harm  lies  in  the  risk  that  some  juiceless  lath-and- 
plaster  prig  or  moralist  among  the  grown-ups  that 
happen  to  surround  him  will  choose  to  magnify  his 
harmless  vapourings  into  serious  offences,  and  de- 
nounce the  child  as  a  "born  little  liar."  Once  call 
a  child  that,  and  you  have  gone  a  long  way  to  make 
him  one.  So  long  as  his  romancings  are  indulged 
in  solely  for  their  own  sake,  and  not  for  any  specific, 
selfish  purpose,  such  as  to  gain  advantage,  or  escape 
a  penalty,  or  discredit  some  one  else,  there  is  little 
need  to  worry  about  them.  All  things  for  him  are 
bathed  in  the  radiance  of  the  "light  that  never  was 
on  sea  or  land."  And  the  time  will  come  all  too  surely 
and  too  soon  when  this  will  fade,  and  he  will  realize 
that  there  "has  passed  away  a  glory  from  the  earth." 
Are  you  anxious  to  hasten  the  coming  of  that  time? 

Let  him  alone,  except  to  laugh  with  him  at  his 
illusions,  and  poke  a  little  gentle  fun  at  them  and 
give  him  time.  He  will  become  as  monotonous, 


THE  CHILD'S  SELF-RESPECT  149 

as  colourless  and  as  uninteresting  and  parrot-like 
a  reproducer  of  the  dull,  cold  facts  in  the  case, 
which  you  dignify  by  the  term  of  "telling  the  truth, " 
as  you  are  yourself.  If  you  had  half  his  imagination 
you  would  lie,  in  the  sense  in  which  you  accuse  him, 
nearly  as  often  as  he  does,  from  sheer  exuberance  of 
spirits. 

But  the  greatest  breeder  of  untruthfulness  in 
young  children  is  the  habit,  which,  alas!  it  is  so  easy 
to  fall  into,  on  the  part  of  particularly  careful  and 
conscientious  parents  and  guardians,  of  surrounding 
their  every  activity,  their  every  hour  of  the  day, 
with  an  elaborate  network  of  rules  and  restrictions 
and  precepts.  Some  of  these,  though  reasonable  in 
themselves,  hedge  the  child  in  at  so  many  points 
that  it  is  scarcely  in  human  nature  to  avoid  con- 
flicting with  them.  Others  are  utterly  absurd  and 
irrational,  and  made  by  us  far  more  out  of  regard 
for  our  own  comfort  and  peace  of  mind  than  for  the 
well-being  of  the  child,  such  as  many  of  the  edicts 
against  noise  and  boisterousness,  and  playing  with 
water,  or  running  on  the  grass,  or  climbing  the 
trees,  for  fear  that  it  will  spoil  his  clothes.  But  the 
main  point  is  that  there  are  so  many  of  them  that 
the  child  can  hardly  even  remember  them  all,  let 
alone  manage  to  observe  them.  And  the  chances 
are  that,  when  suddenly  pounced  upon  by  an  irate 
parent,  or  nurse-maid,  who  demands  with  fury  in 
the  eyes  and  sternness  in  the  voice  whether  he  has 


150  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

been  playing  in  the  bath-room  and  dropped  the 
glass  on  the  floor,  or  taken  the  salt-cellar  for  a  sand- 
box and  heaped  its  contents  on  the  table-cloth, 
he  is  exceedingly  apt,  on  lightning-like  impulse,  to 
say  "No."  And  when  he  has  once  said  it,  of  course 
he  is  bound  to  stick  to  it  from  sheer  perversity  and 
sense  of  self-respect.  Sometimes  he  may  not 
even  remember  whether  the  particular  offence  has 
been  committed.  He  has  done  so  many  things  dur- 
ing the  time  which  to  him  appeared  equally  natural 
and  blameless  that  this  particular  offence  against 
the  peace  of  the  commonwealth  has  not  made  much 
impression  upon  his  memory.  But  very  commonly 
I  believe  he  will  deny  an  accusation  of  this  sort  from 
sheer  contrariness,  just  exactly  as  you  would 
if  some  one  suddenly  accused  you  of  having  behaved 
in  a  cowardly  manner,  or  appeared  in  a  ridiculous 
light,  or  done  a  discreditable  thing.  Sometimes  I 
think  he  has  a  positive  sense  that  the  action  com- 
plained of  was  from  his  point  of  view  innocent,  at 
least  in  intention,  and  that  it  is  none  of  your  business 
to  be  everlastingly  prying  into  his  affairs  and  com- 
pelling him  to  give  an  account  of  everything  that 
he  does,  or  even  thinks.  Nothing  will  make  a  grown 
man  or  woman  more  furiously  indignant,  or  ready  to 
throw  up  a  position  quicker,  than  to  be  perpetually 
bossed  and  overhauled  and  interfered  with,  even 
though  it  be  done  in  the  friendliest  of  spirit. 

We  ought  to  respect  the  reserve,  the  individuality 


THE  CHILD'S  SELF-RESPECT  151 

and  the  self-respect  of  the  child.  Often  a  fib  is 
but  little  more  than  his  way  of  saying,  "None  of  your 
business. "  As  we  recognize  the  truth  of  the  proverb, 
"Ask  me  no  questions,  and  I'll  tell  you  no  lies," 
between  grown-ups,  why  not  between  grown-ups 
and  children?  Let  us  try  and  look  at  the  matter  a 
little  bit  from  his  point  of  view,  before  we  give  our- 
selves over  to  lamentations  that  any  child  of  ours 
should  grow  up  a  liar. 

The  child  is  by  nature  honest,  brave  and  affection- 
ate. But  how  quickly  these  virtues  develop  de- 
pends much  upon  his  environment.  He  is  honest 
by  instinct,  simply  because  honesty  and  truthfulness 
mean  squareness  with  the  universe.  His  natural 
impulses  are  downright  and  straightforward,  often  to 
an  embarrassing  degree.  The  appalling  frankness, 
fearless  outspokenness  and  honesty  of  the  enfant 
terrible  have  passed  into  a  proverb.  Nowhere  else 
is  there  such  a  painter  of 

The  thing  as  he  sees  it, 

For  the  God  of  Things  as  they  are. 

It  is  the  conventions  of  society  and  the  insincerities 
of  his  training  which  make  him  fear  to  express  him- 
self, time-serving,  and  politic.  His  honesty,  in  the 
rational  sense  of  regard  for  the  rights  of  property, 
is  also  instinctive,  but  has  its  peculiarities.  In  the 
beginning,  of  course,  it  is  naturally  confined  to 
respect  for  the  rights  of  property  of  the  only  individ- 


152  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

ual  whose  existence  he  recognizes,  and  that  is  him- 
self. His  idea  of  meum  includes  the  universe  as  he 
knows  it.  But  as  he  gradually  grows  to  recognize 
the  existence  of  other  inhabitants  on  this  planet 
he  discovers  that  they  too  have  similar  rights,  or, 
as  he  would  perhaps  regard  them,  privileges  of 
possession  and  ownership  which,  however  irrational 
he  may  consider  them  at  first,  he  finds  that  it  is  the 
part  of  discretion  to  attempt,  at  least,  to  appear 
to  believe  in.  Another  step,  and  he  finds  that  others 
will  assist  him  to  defend  his  tiny  store  of  trappings 
and  plunder  against  raids  by  a  common  enemy,  on 
condition  of  his  rendering  similar  service  to  them  in 
a  like  emergency.  When  he  has  attained  this,  he 
has  reached  the  full  moral  basis  of  the  Sacred  Rights 
of  Property  in  this  twentieth  century. 

"I  will  respect  your  rights,  if  you  will  respect 
mine,  in  order  that  we  may  both  unite  to  defend 
ourselves  against  those  who  haven't  any  rights  and, 
if  possible,  keep  them  from  getting  any,"  is  the 
way  he  would  express  our  business  morality  of 
the  day. 

In  the  beginning,  of  course,  if  he  be  hungry  and 
sees  food  within  his  reach  he  will  take  it.  But  here 
he  is  only  repeating  ancient  history  and  exercising 
rights  granted  by  unwritten  law  to  every  child  in 
primitive  tribes.  Only  our  higher  civilization  denies 
the  child  this  inborn  right  to  take  food  when  he 
jieeds  it.  But  he  soon  outgrows  this,  and  finds 


THE  CHILD'S  SELF-RESPECT  153 

that  honesty  is  the  best  policy,  on  the  basis  con- 
fessed by  the  Scotch  elder  on  his  death  bed  that  he 
had"  tried  baith." 

The  child  is  courageous,  because  it  is  born  in 
his  blood,  because  it  has  been  the  habit  of  the  race 
from  which  he  is  sprung  for  half  a  million  generations 
back.  The  instinctive  attitude,  the  native  expres- 
sion, of  the  child  is  confident,  fearless.  Most  of 
the  fear  that  is  brought  into  his  young  life  is  brought 
there  by  our  act  and  teaching.  The  ignorant,  care- 
less nurse-maid  to  whom  we  entrust  him  in  his  ear- 
liest years  because  all  he  needs  is  "just  to  be  kept 
out  of  mischief"  teaches  him  the  fear  of  the  dark, 
through  the  bogies  which  she  assures  him  will  clutch 
him  if  he  leaves  his  bed  in  the  corner  of  the  nursery 
while  she  is  downstairs  and  out  of  doors  amusing 
herself. 

By  a  similar  charming  mechanism,  and  for  the 
same  purpose,  the  woods  become  filled  with  bears 
and  wolves  that  will  devour  him  if  he  strays  beyond 
the  garden  walls;  the  streets  with  bad  men  who  will 
carry  him  off  and  sell  him,  or  eat  him;  the  streams 
with  water  kelpies  and  snakes  that  will  pull  him  in 
if  he  so  much  as  looks  over  the  crystal  brim.  In 
other  words,  we  deliberately  try  or  permit  him  to 
be  frightened  into  good  behaviour,  by  peopling 
the  world  around,  into  which  we  do  not  yet  want 
him  to  venture,  with  all  sorts  of  shapes  and  terrors. 
Then  we  wonder  that  he  is  afraid  of  the  dark  and 


154  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

are  most  indignant  with  him  for  objecting  to  being 
left  alone  at  night  after  he  has  been  put  to  bed. 
It  ought  to  be  made  a  criminal  offence  to  put  these 
ideas  of  horror,  these  degrading  and  demoralizing 
superstitions,  into  the  mind  of  a  child  of  the  twen- 
tieth century  at  all. 

Let  the  child  retain  his  brave  and  beautiful  con- 
fidence as  long  as  he  possibly  can.  Then  when  the 
troubles  typified  by  these  dark  and  gruesome  tales 
of  the  underworld  and  the  overworld  really  come 
he  will  have  developed  strength  and  resiliency  to 
meet  and  bear  them.  But  there  is  not  the  slightest 
advantage,  either  to  morals  or  good  common  sense, 
in  making  him  miserable  over  the  awful  things  which, 
whatever  we  may  believe  about  a  future  life,  we  are 
perfectly  sure  do  not  happen,  and  cannot  exist  in 
this.  It  is  only  a  few  centuries  since  grown  men 
began  to  be  free  from  this  awful  dread  of  impending 
evil,  of  a  Resistless  Fate,  in  whose  clutch  they  were 
powerless.  But  we  have  outgrown  it;  and  why  should 
we  insist  on  inflicting  it  by  our  own  voluntary 
or  permitted  action  upon  the  new  generation? 


T 


CHAPTER  IX 

BRICK  WALLS  AND  THE  GROWING  CHILD 

HE  poet  assures  us  that 


Stone  walls  do  not  a  prison  make, 

Nor  iron  bars  a  cage; 
Minds  innocent  and  quiet  take 

These  for  a  hermitage, 


Yet  there  is  something  fundamentally  incongruous 
between  a  healthy,  growing  child  and  a  room  with 
four  walls.  Even  though  the  window  openings  in 
the  aforesaid  walls  be  accurately  adjusted  to  equal 
or  even  exceed  one  fifth  of  the  floor  space;  though 
their  remaining  surfaces  be  opened  to  precisely 
that  tint  which  will  soothe  his  retina  and  stimulate 
his  soul;  though  the  window  seats  be  filled  with 
flowers  and  gold-fish  bowls;  though  the  light  be 
cunningly  trained  to  fall  over  the  left  shoulder, 
and  the  temperature  miraculously  maintained  at  a 
pitch  of  68°,  which,  like  the  law  of  the  Medes  and 
Persians,  "changeth  not,"  yet  will  it  remain  a  prison 
to  the  eye  of  the  unspoiled  young  human  animal. 
A  gilded  and  well-ventilated  cage  —  but  a  cage 
nevertheless  1  You  may  be  able  to  make  him  forget 

'55 


156  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

it  for  half  an  hour,  or  even  an  hour,  but  seldom 
beyond  that.  And  why  should  you  ? 

You  can  tell  a  child  in  an  hour  more  than  he  can 
work  out,  or  test  to  his  own  satisfaction,  in  a  day; 
and  he  can  tell  you  all  that  is  of  importance  about 
what  he  has  done  in  the  day  before,  and  all  the 
deductions  he  can  profitably  draw  from  it,  in  an- 
other hour.  So  why  confine  him  in  the  schoolroom 
for  longer  than  these  two  periods?  He  grows  by 
living,  and  he  learns  by  doing;  neither  of  these  can 
be  done  as  well  in  the  schoolhouse  as  elsewhere. 
Is  there  any  good  and  valid  reason  why  schooling, 
which  usurps  and  dominates  the  period  of  our  most 
rapid  growth  —  and  should  be  an  aid  to  that  growth 
—  should  be  so  exclusively  carried  on  indoors? 

The  trouble  with  institutions  is  that  they  do 
not  die  when  the  men  who  invented  them  do;  and 
with  buildings,  that  they  last  longer  than  their 
builders.  Jehovah  was  most  wise  when  he  buried 
Moses's  stone  tables  of  the  law  with  him,  where 
nobody  was  ever  able  to  find  them  again,  and  would 
not  permit  his  chosen  people  to  have  a  permanent 
building  in  which  to  worship,  for  eight  hundred 
years.  The  letter  always  becomes  stronger  than 
the  law  that  it  preserves;  the  building  greater 
than  the  purpose  for  which  it  was  built.  Our 
present  system  of  education  suffers  under  a  positive 
obsession  —  a  very  nightmare  of  schoolroom. 

It  must  be  frankly  admitted  that  the  schoolroom 


BRICK  WALLS  AND  GROWING  CHILD  157 

has,  and  always  has  had,  two  distinct  functions  - 
one,  to  keep  the  children  out  of  mischief,  the  other 
to  teach  them  something.  The  heaviest  and  most 
irksome  part  of  the  teacher's  duty  to-day  is  nursery- 
maid work.  Schoolrooms  are  still  places  of  confine- 
ment; indeed  in  the  earlier  days  were  more  of  this 
than  founts  of  learning.  In  the  Dames'  Schools  and 
Hedge  Schools  of  a  century  ago  luckless  little  tots 
were  kept  sitting  for  hours  at  a  stretch  on  benches 
where  their  feet  could  not  touch  the  ground,  with 
little  or  nothing  to  do  but  drop  asleep  and  fall  off. 
While  upon  one  side  of  its  pedigree,  so  to  speak, 
the  teaching  profession  is  of  the  highest  and  noblest 
lineage,  upon  the  other  side,  alas!  it  harks  back  to 
a  very  different  kind  of  ancestry  —  some  toothless 
old  crone  who  was  too  decrepit  to  do  anything  more 
strenuous  than  to  keep  the  babies  out  of  mischief; 
or  some  undersized  weakling,  or  even  cripple,  who 
was  too  feeble  to  work  in  the  fields,  or  fight  in  the 
wars.  Of  course  we  have  long  since  abandoned 
this  principle  of  selecting  teachers,  just  as  the 
English  gentry  no  longer  follow  the  rule  that  "the 
fool  of  the  family  goes  into  the  church";  and  the 
time  of  the  children  is  now  as  fully  and  intelligently 
occupied  as  that  of  convicts  in  a  model  prison. 
But  traces  of  the  ancient  regime  still  survive  in  the 
facts  that  the  teaching  profession  is  the  unskilled 
intellectual  labour  market,  and  the  school  day  is 
still  planned  upon  the  principle  of  covering  all  the 


158  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

time  of  the  child,  except  the  hours  required  for  meals, 
chores  and  running  errands,  regardless  of  whether 
the  work  of  education  might  not  be  better  and  more 
profitably  done  elsewhere. 

So  heavily  has  the  schoolroom  obsessed  us  that 
the  mere  spending  of  five  hours  a  day  within  its 
Sacred  Walls  has  come  to  be  regarded  as  a  virtue 
and  an  end  in  itself;  and  the  question  of  the  new 
education  is  how  much  of  the  work  that  is  now  done 
in  the  schoolroom  could  be  better  done  in  the  garden, 
the  playground  and  the  shop?  Its  practical  problem 
is  how  to  reduce  a  part  of  the  schoolroom  to  solely 
that  portion  of  the  work  which  cannot  be  better 
done  elsewhere.  And  it  is  coming  to  be  the  con- 
sensus of  opinion  of  thoughtful  educators,  of  careful 
child  students,  as  it  has  long  been  that  of  the 
physician  and  the  biologist,  that  this  would  mean  a 
reduction  of  present  hours  by  at  least  one  half,  if 
not  two  thirds. 

But  the  question  will  be  raised  at  once:  How  can 
we  then  possibly  complete  our  inspired  curriculum 
and  reach  our  Sacred  Standards  at  the  required 
time?  Surely,  if  a  given  amount  of  work  can  barely 
be  done  in  five  hours  a  day,  only  half  that  amount 
of  work  can  be  done  in  two  and  a  half  hours  a  day. 
This  was  the  logic  of  the  old  education  —  that  of 
the  new  is  different! 

Even  in  the  world  of  labour  it  has  been  dis- 
covered that  the  apparent  paradox  holds  good; 


BRICK  WALLS  AND  GROWING  CHILD  159 

the  shorter  the  hours,  the  more  and  the  better  the 
work  done.  The  shortened  schoolroom  day  can  be 
abundantly  justified  on  two  broad  grounds:  First, 
that  as  the  child's  brain  is  part  of  his  body  and  grows 
with  that  body  and  in  response  to  its  needs,  what- 
ever time  is  necessary  to  keep  that  body  healthy 
and  vigorous  and  growing  will  increase  the  rapidity 
with  which  the  child  learns,  and  is  to  be  regarded, 
broadly  considered,  part  of  his  education.  The 
second,  or  internal  reason,  is  even  more  important, 
viz.,  —  that  instead  of  the  purpose  of  education  being 
to  treat  the  child  as  if  he  were  a  bushel  basket,  or 
a  milk  bucket,  and  fill  him  up  with  so  many  quarts 
or  so  many  gallons  of  information,  so  that  his  in- 
tellectual contents  will  reach  a  certain  level  at  the 
end  of  each  year  until  he  is  full  up  on  Commence- 
ment Day  —  its  real  purpose  is  to  develop  the  child's 
powers  so  that  he  will  be  able  to  acquire  information, 
draw  correct  conclusions  from  it,  and  utilize  it  for 
himself.  The  best  way  yet  devised  of  doing  this 
is  to  give  the  child  an  interest  in  his  work;  to  kindle 
in  him,  as  Locke  quaintly  expresses  it,  "a  liking 
for  learning,"  so  that  he  will  continue  his  own 
education  by  his  own  volition,  and  work  with  his 
teachers  and  instructors,  instead  of  against  them. 
For  the  discipline  and  obedience  of  the  old  education, 
the  new  would  substitute  enthusiasm  and  initiative. 
Both  of  these  can  be  cultivated  far  better  outside 
of  the  schoolroom  than  in  it. 


160  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

It  is  as  natural  for  a  child  to  learn  as  it  is  for  him 
to  grow;  in  fact  it  is  impossible  for  him  to  grow 
without  learning,  though  he  may  do  certain  arti- 
ficial kinds  of  learning  without  growing  much. 
His  desire  to  know  is  as  keen  as  his  appetite  for 
food,  and  as  insatiable.  No  more  vivid  charac- 
terization of  a  child  has  ever  been  sketched  than 
in  Kipling's  charming  little  verse: 

I  have  six  faithful  serving  men,  who  taught  me  all  I  knew; 
Their  names  are  Why,  and  How,  and  What,  and  Where,  and 
When,  and  Who. 

*         *        *        * 

I  know  a  person  small, 

Who  has  a  swarm  of  serving  men  who  get  no  rest  at  all, 

She  sends  them  abroad  on  her  own  affairs 

From  the  moment  she  opens  her  eyes; 

A  hundred  Whats,  a  thousand  Wheres,  and  seven  million  Whys! 

He  is  simply  an  embodied  interrogation  point! 
Even  his  oft-deplored  tendency  to  get  into  mischief 
is  simply  due  to  his  overmastering  desire  to  poke 
his  fingers  into  everything,  to  investigate  the  secret 
springs  and  causes  of  their  phenomenon,  and  live 
up  to  the  rule  of  the  Mongoose  Family,  which  is, 
"Go  and  find  out!" 

He  is  interested  in  everything  about  him  with  a 
fine  indiscriminateness;  things  profitable  and  un- 
profitable, edifying  and  unedifying.  The  one  prob- 
lem of  the  teacher  is  to  pick  out  profitable  sub- 
jects and  direct  his  attention  in  their  direction. 


BRICK  WALLS  AND  GROWING  CHILD  161 

If  you  keep  him  well  occupied  with  these  he  will 
have  little  time  and  less  inclination  for  unprofit- 
able and  unedifying  researches.  Fortunately  the 
things  he  "Wants  to  Know"  most  keenly  are 
usually  among  the  most  fundamental  and  vitally 
important.  No  questions,  save  those  of  a  very 
wise  man,  go  so  unerringly  and  directly  to  the 
heart  of  a  matter  as  those  of  a  child.  Indeed, 
there  is  more  than  ground  for  suspecting  that  the 
old,  formal  cut-and-dried  education  was  devised 
quite  as  much  as  a  defence  for  the  stupidity  and 
peace  of  mind  of  the  teacher,  as  for  the  benefit  of 
the  taught. 

Teach  a  child  a  subject  out  of  a  book,  hold  him 
strictly  to  the  text  and  all  you  need  to  do  is  to 
keep  a  couple  of  pages  ahead  of  him.  Take  him 
into  a  shop,  a  garden,  or  a  laboratory,  let  him  ask 
questions  for  himself  and  demand  that  your  an- 
swers shall  square  with  the  facts,  and  he  will  strain 
the  powers  of  the  wisest  and  most  resourceful. 
The  education  which  does  not  develop  and  exer- 
cise the  teacher  quite  as  fully  and  vigorously  as 
the  taught,  is  built  on  the  wrong  principle!  The 
school  ought  to  be  the  last  place  where  a  dull  or 
formal  mind  will  find  itself  at  home,  instead  of  a 
restful  haven  for  mediocrity. 

The  schoolroom  is  the  natural  home  of  formalism 
and  pedantry,  the  temple  of  the  "Letter  that 
killeth."  It  can  cover  profitably  only  a  part, 


162  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

and  a  small  part,  of  the  education  of  the  child. 
All  signs  point  toward  the  reducing  of  the  school- 
room from  its  present  denomination  to  a  sub- 
ordinate place  in  the  scheme  of  teaching,  as  the 
next  great  forward  step  in  education. 

Perhaps  it  might  be  better  expressed  rather  as  a 
broadening  of  the  conception  and  expansion  of  the 
scope  of  the  school  than  a  degrading,  or  limiting  of 
the  role  of  the  schoolroom.  As  Wesley's  parish  was 
the  world,  so  in  the  new  education  the  entire  en- 
vironment of  the  child  is  his  schoolroom,  and  should 
be  utilized  in  his  education.  Half  a  century  ago, 
the  educational  needs  of  a  community  were  con- 
sidered amply  met  by  a  room  with  benches,  desks, 
a  blackboard  and  chalks,  slates,  pencils  and  paper, 
and  a  few  books.  What  more  apparatus  could 
either  child  or  teacher  require  for  giving  and  getting 
"an  eddication"? 

Even  for  the  Higher  Education,  the  required 
"plant"  was  almost  equally  simple.  President 
Garfield's  idea  of  a  college  —  and  an  admirable 
one  so  far  as  it  went  —  was  "a  log  with  President 
Hopkins  on  one  end  of  it  and  a  student  on  the 
other!"  Of  course,  an  educational  genius  like 
President  Hopkins  would  have  been  the  last  one 
to  make  of  those  "log  conferences"  anything  more 
than  an  hour's  discussion  of  work  already  done, 
or  plans  for  work  to  be  done.  But  the  idea  of  re- 
quired equipment  for  even  a  college  in  those  days 


BRICK  WALLS  AND  GROWING  CHILD    163 

was  extraordinarily  bare  and  simple.  A  building 
with  rooms  enough  to  accommodate  all  the  stu- 
dents who  would  be  reciting  at  one  time,  a  sufficient 
number  of  teachers  to  hear  those  recitations,  and 
"set"  the  lessons  for  the  next  day  or  to  deliver 
formal  lectures  filling  so  many  hours  per  week, 
per  term.  For  a  library,  the  textbooks  of  the 
students,  plus  those  personally  accumulated  by  the 
professors,  and  a  few  encyclopaedias,  concordances 
and  other  reference  works.  The  campus,  simply 
a  stretch  of  ground  large  enough  to  contain  the 
buildings,  the  whole  establishment  not  costing 
more  than  a  few  tens  of  thousands  of  dollars. 

But  to-day  what  a  difference!  The  recitation 
rooms  and  the  teachers'  salaries  are  the  smallest 
items;  huge  laboratories  are  demanded  where 
students  can  do  research  work  for  themselves  and 
demonstrate  the  soundness  of  laws  and  principles, 
instead  of  merely  learning  them  by  rote  and  accept- 
ing them  on  authority;  machine  shops  and  en- 
gineering establishments  where  hand  and  eye  can 
be  trained  as  well  as  brain;  museums  and  collec- 
tions of  natural  history,  of  botany,  of  geology,  of 
electrical  and  physical  apparatus,  of  manufactures, 
and  of  art,  where  specimens  of  the  most  interesting 
facts  and  examples  of  the  most  important  work  of 
the  world  can  be  seen  and  handled;  colleges  of 
music,  concert  halls  and  pipe  organs,  where  the 
musical  side  of  our  natures  can  be  cultivated. 


164  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

The  library  has  become  a  great  aggregation  of  a 
dozen  special  libraries  and  collections,  together 
with  large  stores  of  original  documents,  of  copies 
of  important  records  where  the  students  may 
quarry  out  information  for  themselves,  and  to 
assist  them  in  utilizing  this  huge  treasure-house, 
a  librarian  and  staff  of  assistants  almost  as  large 
as  the  entire  faculty  of  the  primitive  college. 

Then  come  gymnasia,  swimming  pools,  athletic 
fields,  artificial  lakes  for  rowing  —  everything,  in 
fact,  that  will  appeal  to  all  the  interests  and  pro- 
mote the  whole  development  of  every  power  of 
man.  The  college  has  become  a  miniature  world 
and,  in  spite  of  the  dreadful  dominance  of  mediaeval 
and  scholastic  ideals  which  still  persists,  the  college 
man  is  trained  and  fitted  for  life  as  never  before! 

Something  of  the  same  subversive  change,  though 
upon  simpler,  broader  and  more  natural  lines, 
is  due  —  indeed,  already  under  way  —  in  our 
common  schools.  The  school  existing  in  the  midst 
of  a  community  can  utilize  that  community  instead 
of  having  to  create  its  own,  as  the  college  must. 
The  walls  of  the  schoolroom  are  already  melting 
into  thin  air.  Classes  are  becoming  flying  columns 
of  explorers  and  investigators;  the  teachers,  peri- 
patetic instead  of  sedentary  philosophers.  The 
whole  educational  army  is  being  mobilized  for  ma- 
noeuvres in  the  open  field,  instead  of  staying  in  a 
barracks  the  year  round  doing  yard  drill,  reciting 


BRICK  WALLS  AND  GROWING  CHILD  165 

tactics   out   of   a   book,    and   campaigning   on   the 
blackboard. 

Here  is  an  outline  of  the  tendencies  and  general 
drift  of  the  new  spirit  in  education.  It  is  mani- 
festing itself  in  two  ways:  making  instruction  in 
the  schoolroom  less  formal,  and  its  condition  more 
wholesome  and  natural;  and  doing  more  and  more 
of  the  work  of  education  outside  of  the  schoolroom. 
In  the  first  place  that  diabolical  trinity  of  the  old 
education,  the  Sacred  Three  R's,  has  been  cast  down 
from  its  shrine  and  reduced  to  its  proper  place,  as 
servant  and  instrument  in  the  mental  development 
of  the  child,  instead  of  an  object  of  worship  and  end 
in  itself.  It  is  possible  that  we  may  in  time  get  rid  of 
that  ancient  abomination,  the  Spelling  Class,  and 
McGufTey's  "Book  of  Prayer,"  as  they  have  already 
done  in  Germany.  But  that  will  require  rational- 
ized and  civilized  spelling  first.  The  child's  mind 
on  entering  school  is  no  longer  regarded  as  a  blank 
page  upon  which  anything  desired  by  the  teacher 
may  be  written,  and  upon  which  nothing  of  im- 
portance will  be  written  except  what  she  inscribes. 
The  first  business  of  the  modern  intelligent  primary 
teacher  is  to  investigate  the  contents  of  the  child's 
mind;  in  other  words,  to  find  out  exactly  what  it 
knows,  the  clearness  of  its  ideas  and  its  grasp  upon 
their  relations  to  one  another.  Then  it  is  given 
some  simple,  natural  object  like  an  apple,  or  a  flower, 
or  the  picture  of  a  bird,  asked  to  tell  the  teacher 


166  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

and  the  other  children  what  it  knows  about  it; 
then  the  other  children  add  their  quota  of  infor- 
mation. If  the  items  volunteered  disagree,  they 
will  be  encouraged  to  discuss  the  question  to  find 
out  what  are  the  actual  facts  in  the  case;  then  they 
model  the  object  in  clay,  or  wax,  do  their  best  to 
make  a  drawing  of  it  upon  the  board  and  are  given 
its  name  and  told  to  write  it  underneath  it,  not 
by  letters  or  words,  but  as  a  whole  picture. 

Children,  by  the  way,  can  write  words  just  as 
easily  as  letters,  and  far  more  easily  than  pot-hooks 
and  such  inventions  of  inspired  idiocy.  How  many 
of  us  to-day,  who  can  write  a  respectable  hand  would 
undertake  to  fill  a  page  with  pot-hooks  that  would 
pass  muster  and  win  us  a  high  mark?  In  like 
manner,  the  qualities  or  experiences  and  actions 
of  the  bird,  flower,  or  pine  cone  are  added  to  it, 
each  as  a  new  sacred  sign,  and  in  a  short  time  the 
children  are  writing  without  having  ever  formally 
learned  their  letters. 

The  next  demon  of  the  Trinity,  Reading,  is 
mastered  in  an  equally  simple  and  straightforward 
manner.  A  dozen  excellent  methods  are  in  use, 
each  one  of  them  the  best  for  the  teacher  who  has 
devised  it  or  is  most  skilled  in  its  use.  Any  of 
them  will  reach  the  result,  which  is  all  that  is 
needed!  One,  for  instance,  that  is  in  use  in  the 
Watt  School  in  Chicago  is  that  of  finding  for  each 
one  of  the  children  some  verse  or  nursery  rhyme,  or 


BRICK  WALLS  AND  GROWING  CHILD  167 

little  song  with  which  he  is  familiar.  Then  these 
are  printed  from  the  school  press  by  the  pupils 
of  the  higher  grades,  and  the  child  is  helped  to 
read  his  familiar  favourite  at  sight,  taking  each  word 
as  a  separate  picture  with  a  meaning  of  its  own. 
Then  another  verse,  which  he  can  recite,  is  handed 
to  him  and  he  eye-reads  this  in  the  same  manner. 
Words  really  have  a  great  deal  more  individuality 
than  letters,  and  it  isn't  long  before  he  learns  to 
recognize  at  sight  all  the  commoner  words  in  use 
in  such  verses  and  ballads,  and  any  new  words 
which  resemble  them  he  can,  in  the  language  of  the 
street,  "make  a  stab  at." 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  this  is  precisely  the  method 
which  we  fully  educated  and  graduated  grown-ups 
use  in  reading.  Any  new,  or  unfamiliar  word  is  at 
first  pronounced  as  the  known  word  which  it  looks 
most  like.  Hence,  the  delicious  blunders  of  Mrs. 
Malaprop  and  "English  as  She  is  Wrote."  To 
stop  and  spell  a  new  word  out,  letter  by  letter  is  a 
slow  and  painful  process  and  one  seldom  resorted 
to  by  even  well-educated  individuals.  We  usually 
either  skip  it,  or  call  it  "that"  until  we  can  hear 
some  more  erudite  person  pronounce  it  properly. 

The  last  demon  to  be  exorcised  —  -  'Rithmetic 
—  is  cast  out  in  even  more  bland  and  childlike 
fashion.  Five  woolly  sheep  are  added  to  three 
painted,  red  cows  and  the  result  ascertained. 
One  wee  handful  of  marbles  is  taken  out  of  a  small 


168  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

bagful  and  the  remainder  counted.  Three  little 
tots  each  put  two  beans  into  a  cup  and  ascertain 
the  result;  or  twenty  jack-straws  are  distributed 
equally  among  five  players.  And  the  children 
come  to  recognize  these  results,  to  realize  that  they 
will  always  occur  and  the  simple  principle  on  which 
they  occur,  without  even  knowing  they  are  suf- 
fering the  tortures  of  addition,  subtraction  and 
division,  to  say  nothing  of  the  "vexation"  of  mul- 
tiplication, and  the  insanity  of  fractions. 

The  capacity  of  the  human  mind  for  self-hum- 
buggery  is  something  enormous  and  incredible. 
Even  in  the  zenith  of  our  powers,  we  spell  not  by 
"Lindley  Murray,"  or  "Webster,"  but  according 
to  whether  a  word  "looks  right"  after  we  have 
written  it.  We  write  not  upon  Spencerian  prin- 
ciples, but  upon  the  simplest  and  most  rapid  method 
of  scratching  down  some  sort  of  turkey-tracks 
which  intelligent  and  inspired  correspondents  will 
recognize  as  meant  for  a  word  or  a  sentence.  We 
read  by  recognizing  words  as  we  would  the  turns 
in  a  familiar  road,  and  glimpsing  whole  sentences 
as  we  would  go  down  stairs  three  steps  at  a  time. 
Not  one  in  fifty  of  us  can  pronounce,  or  even  come 
within  shouting  distance  of  the  correct  pronuncia- 
tion of  an  utterly  unfamiliar  word.  Our  actual 
knowledge  of  arithmetic  and  the  higher  mathematics 
has  shrunk  to,  and  consists  of,  ability  to  add  up 
in  our  heads  figures  under  ten  in  columns  not  to 


BRICK  WALLS  AND  GROWING  CHILD  169 

exceed  five  places  in  length,  to  multiply  numbers 
under  ten  by  figures  of  less  than  seven,  providing 
that  we  happen  to  remember  correctly  whether 
seven  times  nine  is  sixty-three,  or  fifty-six,  and  to 
divide  any  melon  that  comes  our  way,  so  that  we 
will  get  the  lion's  share  of  it,  and  the  other  fellow 
the  little  end. 

He  is  a  rara  avis  who  can  add  up  a  column  of 
figures,  say  a  page  of  an  average  bank  book,  and 
get  an  accurate  result  in  less  than  five  trials.  And 
yet  we  insist  upon  our  luckless  infants  being  grounded 
and  drilled  and  instructed  in  all  the  superb  prin- 
ciples and  intricate  applications  of  the  Great 
Science  of  mathematics.  All  the  mathematics  that 
we  actually  retain,  and  practically  use  —  unless 
we  are  engineers  or  bank  clerks  —  could  be  taught 
to  an  intelligent  boy  of  fourteen  in  one  year.  What 
is  the  use  of  binding  upon  each  rising  generation 
burdens  which  we  no  longer  dream  of  bearing,  and 
insisting  upon  their  learning,  with  great  labour 
and  discomfort,  a  large  amount  of  unnatural  and 
unnecessary  material  which  they  will  industriously 
proceed  to  forget  as  soon  as  they  leave  school? 
We  read  by  eye,  we  cipher  by  rote,  we  write  by 
"main  force  and  awkwardness"  and  we  spell  by 
guess  and  God's  mercy! 

It  is  high  time  that  this  solemn  farce  and  hypo- 
critical humbuggery  of  holding  up  standards  for 
the  infant  mind  which  we  never  dream  of  living 


170  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

up  to  ourselves  should  be  abandoned.  Of  course, 
we  will  be  told  at  once  that  there  is  altogether 
too  much  of  this  sort  of  thing  going  on  already, 
that  children  are  no  longer  "larned"  to  spell  prop- 
erly and  that  the  average  common-school  graduate 
can  neither  write  a  decent  letter,  add  up  a  column 
of  figures  correctly,  nor  read  aloud  with  intelligence 
and  expression.  But  this  complaint  of  the  short- 
comings of  the  rising  generation  is  one  of  the  oldest 
stock-in-trade  jeremiads  of  history.  It  was  common 
talk  in  the  days  of  the  pyramids;  it  was  a  "gag" 
of  the  Indignant  Parent  in  the  Greek  dramas,  and 
I  have  little  doubt  that  it  was  the  shocking  spelling, 
or  abominable  writing,  or  both  combined,  of  Shem, 
Ham  and  Japheth  that  drove  the  venerable  Noah 
to  drink!  As  a  matter  of  fact,  most  men  and 
women,  save  those  whose  necessary  occupations, 
such  as  business  correspondence,  or  social  notes, 
have  driven  them  to  much  letter-writing,  write 
poorly  and  spell  worse!  To  make  out  that  the 
poor  youngster  on  leaving  school  is  singular  or 
peculiar  in  this  respect,  is  a  rank  injustice.  Even 
the  "Father  of  his  Country"  would  never  have  got 
more  than  two  places  from  the  bottom  in  a  fifth 
grade  spelling  class! 

When  the  child  is  to  be  introduced  to  the  Great 
Wide  World  about  him,  initiated  into  the  high  and 
solemn  mysteries  of  "Jografry"  and  History,  then 
the  schoolroom  is  boldly  departed  from.  Instead 


BRICK  WALLS  AND  GROWING  CHILD  171 

of  beginning  by  introducing  the  blunt  end  of  the 
wedge  into  the  infant  mind  in  the  form  of  a  mys- 
terious globe  or  a  strangely-shaped  picture  puzzle 
with  wriggley  edges,  like  nothing  else  in  the  heavens 
above  nor  on  the  earth  beneath,  called  the  Con- 
tinent of  North  America  —  which  is  about  as  in- 
telligible to  a  child  as  a  sheet  of  music  would  be  to 
a  puppy  —  he  is  set  to  studying  and  drawing  maps, 
or  plans  of  the  street  on  which  he  lives,  then  the 
suburb,  or  ward  in  which  the  school  is  built,  his 
home  town  and  the  country  that  surrounds  it, 
the  roads  and  railroads  which  run  out  of  it  and 
what  they  carry  away  for  sale,  or  bring  in  for  use. 
He  draws  plans  of  his  schoolhouse,  maps  of  its 
grounds  and  of  the  house  in  which  he  lives,  and 
the  farm,  or  suburb,  in  which  it  stands.  He 
gets  to  understand  the  meaning  of  paths,  and 
roads  and  the  things  and  places  which  lie  at  the 
other  end  of  them.  This  leads  him  at  once,  in- 
satiably curious,  out  into  the  valley,  or  great  plain, 
or  range  of  mountains  which  surrounds  his  home; 
to  the  wonders  of  the  county  seat  and  the  Great 
City,  and  the  Capital  of  the  state  and  the  broad 
Fatherland  of  which  all  these  are  a  part.  Instead 
of  learning  to  define,  with  great  labour,  a  penin- 
sula>  or  other  "body  of  absurdity  almost  entirely 
surrounded  by  words,"  —  a  term,  by  the  way, 
when  completely  mastered,  he  will  probably  have 
occasion  to  use  about  once  in  fourteen  years,  after 


172  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

he  leaves  the  classroom  —  he  is  taken  to  the  banks, 
or  sand  bars,  of  the  nearest  stream  and  shown 
those  and  other  text-book  phenomena  such  as  Capes, 
Islands,  Bays,  Straits,  Valleys,  Plains  and  Hills 
"in  the  flesh,"  so  that  he  will  want  to  know  what 
their  names  are  himself  and,  what  is  even  more 
important,  see  at  the  same  glance  how  they  are 
made  and  the  forces  that  are  at  work  shaping 
the  face  of  the  world.  This  leads  at  once  into 
physical  geography,  geology,  meteorology,  to  say 
nothing  of  nature  study  of  all  sorts,  botany,  zoology 
and  agriculture.  In  fact  the  only  limit  to  the  things 
and  subjects  that  can  be  studied  from  life  and  at 
white  heat  of  curiosity  in  such  excursions,  is  the  range 
of  the  teacher's  knowledge  and  the  limitations  of  the 
children's  time. 

History,  instead  of  an  appalling  succession  of 
dates  and  presidents,  of  kings  and  queens  and 
famous  battles  and  the  "Rise  and  Fall  Off"  of 
empires,  becomes  a  keen,  gossipy,  first-hand  study 
of  the  history  and  experiences  of  our  own  town, 
the  date  of  its  founding,  the  site  of  its  first  building, 
its  city  hall,  its  jail,  or  court-house,  details  of  its 
growth  from  the  cluster  of  cabins  at  the  crossroads, 
the  coming  of  the  first  railway,  the  building  of  its 
first  factory,  the  erection  of  its  first  brick  or  stone 
business  block.  Old  buildings  are  explored,  cellars 
and  garrets  scoured  for  relics  and  mementoes  of 
earlier  days;  and  if  a  public  historical  museum  is 


BRICK  WALLS  AND  GROWING  CHILD  173 

not  in  existence,  an  amateur  one  is  established  in 
the  schoolhouse.  If  the  birthplace  of  some  great 
man,  or  the  place  of  some  notable  event  of  general 
interest  is  to  be  found  in  the  town,  a  tablet  is 
erected  by  the  children  to  commemorate  it.  Long 
before  this  study  is  complete,  of  course,  from  half 
to  two  thirds  of  the  history  of  the  county  has 
been  uncovered;  and  a  considerable  share  of  that 
of  the  state,  and  of  the  nation  as  well.  And  the 
child  is  not  only  ready,  but  eager,  to  learn  all  about 
the  history  of  these,  or  at  least  every  part  of  it 
which  can  be  brought  into  direct  contact  with, 
or  has  influence  upon,  himself  and  his  town;  and 
few  other  items  are  worth  remembering  in  any 
place.  If  any  events  or  names  are  so  dead  that 
they  exist  only  upon  monuments,  or  in  written 
records,  and  awake  no  echo  and  leave  no  trace 
of  influence  upon  the  present,  then  they  had  better 
remain  forgotten ! 

One  of  the  obvious  advantages  of  this  natural 
method  of  education  is  its  elasticity  and  perfect 
adaptability  to  all  localities  and  conditions.  The 
smaller  the  town,  or  more  rural  the  school  dis- 
trict then  the  more  abundant  and  easily  accessible 
are  the  broadest  and  most  vitally  important  pages 
in  the  great  book  of  Nature  —  the  fields,  the  gardens, 
the  farms,  the  brooks,  and  hills.  Its  only  difficulty 
and  expense  will  be  in  the  matter  of  occasional 
trips  to  county  seats,  or  state  capitals  for  his- 


174  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

torical,  and  to  adjacent  cities,  or  neighbouring 
towns  for  commercial  purposes.  At  the  other 
end  of  the  scale,  the  larger  the  community,  the  more 
strictly  urban  the  school  district,  the  more  abun- 
dant will  be  its  free,  educational  "plant"  in  the 
matter  of  factories,  workshops,  museums,  botanical 
gardens,  expositions  and  great  public  buildings, 
and  the  presence  of  large  rivers,  or  bays,  or  of 
great  transportation,  or  electric  systems.  Its 
heaviest  expense  and  greatest  difficulty  lies  in 
getting  the  free,  open-air  surroundings  so  vitally 
necessary  for  a  schoolhouse,  and  the  gardens, 
sheds  and  shops  in  which  children  can  be  given 
practical  training  of  hand  and  eye  together  with 
brain,  which  they  secure  without  expense  in  their 
own  homes,  the  garden  and  barnyards  in  smaller 
towns  and  in  country  districts. 

Two  well-marked  tendencies  are  already  at  work 
to  balance  up,  as  it  were,  these  inequalities,  which 
give  promise  already  of  going  far  to  solve  the 
problem.  One  of  these  is  already  in  existence  — 
the  large,  well-organized,  well-equipped,  central, 
cooperative  schools  situated  on  the  edge  of  a  town 
or  village,  to  which  the  children  from  six  or  eight 
surrounding  country  districts  are  brought  in  cov- 
ered wagons  or  'busses  every  morning  and  taken 
back  to  their  homes  in  the  evening.  These  have 
been  found  to  be  exceedingly  satisfactory  in  prac- 
tical operation,  combining  the  freedom,  fresh  air, 


BRICK  WALLS  AND  GROWING  CHILD  175 

good  food  and  direct  contact  with  nature  of  the 
country,  with  that  stimulus  which  comes  from 
contact  with  a  crowd  and  the  longer  terms,  better 
methods  and  more  skilful  and  helpful  teaching 
of  the  city  school  with  its  well  paid  staff. 

At  the  other  end  of  the  scale,  the  reverse  process 
has  already  been  initiated,  particularly  in  certain 
German  and  English  municipalities,  of  carrying 
the  school  children  of  the  central  and  crowded 
districts  of  great  cities  out  to  the  suburbs,  or  even 
the  open  country,  to  school.  By  utilizing  the 
suburban  trolleys  and  trains  of  the  morning  rush- 
hour,  which,  after  running  into  the  city  filled  and 
crowded  with  clerks,  operatives  and  business  men, 
are  running  back  almost  empty,  the  expense  of 
transportation  can  be  made  comparatively  trifling 
and  is  more  than  balanced  by  the  great  saving  in 
expense  of  land  for  school  buildings,  playgrounds 
and  gardens. 

These  schools  were  originally  planned  for  chil- 
dren in  poor  health,  particularly  those  who  were 
believed  to  be  likely  to  develop  tuberculosis; 
and  as  their  principal  purpose  was  to  build  up 
the  health  of  the  children,  their  programme  was 
constructed  upon  this  basis  and  included  some 
two  hours'  sleep  in  the  open  air,  and  a  large  share 
of  the  time  for  games,  gardening  and  play.  Only 
enough  class  work  was  given  to  keep  the  children 
from  forgetting  what  they  had  already  learned. 


176  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

But  to  the  surprise  of  everybody  connected  with 
them,  these  little  half-invalids  not  only  held  their 
own,  but  actually  made  up  grades  when  they  were 
behind;  and  on  an  average  made  faster  progress 
than  their  healthy  room-mates  in  the  schools  down- 
town. 

A  similar  delightful  result  has  been  obtained  in 
the  open  air  schools  for  the  children  of  tubercular 
parents,  and  others  predisposed  to  be  tubercular, 
conducted  by  the  departments  of  education  in 
Boston  and  New  York  City.  It  is  one  of  the 
ironies  of  our  boasted  system  of  education  that  a 
child  must  develop  tuberculosis  before  it  can  obtain 
healthy  and  ideal  school  surroundings.  The  same 
method  has  been  applied  to  healthy  children  in  both 
private  and  public  schools,  with  equally  gratifying 
results. 

An  amusing  instance  occurred  in  the  town  of 
Chelsea,  Mass.,  after  its  destructive  fire,  which  swept 
out  of  existence  two  thirds  of  its  school  buildings. 
As  a  temporary  war  measure,  as  fast  as  buildings 
could  be  constructed  they  were  utilized  for  the  in- 
struction of  double  the  ordinary  number  of  chil- 
dren, each  squad  being  given  half  the  usual  hours 
in  school,  and  the  remainder  of  the  time  in  super- 
vised play  in  public  playgrounds  and  in  parks. 
Before  they  had  succeeded  in  supplying  the  number 
of  buildings  considered  necessary  for  their  school 
population,  vague  reports  began  to  come  in  of  the 


BRICK  WALLS  AND  GROWING  CHILD  177 

excellent  progress  that  the  children  were  making 
on  this  half-time  principle.  The  wondering  school 
board  decided  to  look  into  the  matter,  and  on 
making  thorough  investigation  found  that  not  only 
the  health  of  the  children  but  the  progress  in  their 
studies  was  so  much  better  under  the  two-hours- 
a-day-in-the-schoolhouse  regime  that  they  decided 
to  continue  the  experiment  further  and  postpone 
the  building  of  the  extra  schools. 

One  of  the  most  significant  and  convincing  tests 
of  the  superiority  of  the  open-air  school  was  that 
made  in  one  of  the  public  schools  of  Chicago  under 
the  auspices  of  its  broad-minded  and  progressive 
school  superintendent,  Mrs.  Ella  Flagg  Young,  on  the 
initiative  of  its  enthusiastic  and  original  principal, 
Professor  Watt.  Its  results  are  specially  significant 
because  the  school  is  a  typical  downtown  city  school 
on  the  edge  of  the  stockyards  district,  attended  chiefly 
by  the  children  of  artisans  and  day  labourers,  and 
with  a  large  sprinkling  of  foreign  element,  so  that  the 
material  is  neither  selected,  nor  especially  promising. 
As  classes  are  so  large  that  they  have  to  be  divided, 
the  two  rooms  occupied  by  the  first  grade  children 
were  converted  first  by  the  throwing  all  the  win- 
dows wide  open  and  keeping  them  so,  except  upon 
the  side  from  which  storms  come  in  winter.  Then 
the  benches  and  desks  were  taken  out  and  the 
whole  floor  space  of  the  room  turned  over  to  the 
children,  who  were  supplied  with  toys,  working 


178  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

material,  games,  books,  and  pictures,  and  en- 
couraged to  form  themselves,  under  the  guidance 
of  two  young  and  sympathetic  teachers  in  each 
room,  into  groups  for  purposes  of  play  or  work.  They 
were  allowed  to  wear  their  outdoor  garments  when- 
ever they  wished  and,  as  Professor  Watt  expressed 
it,  "they  could  change  their  seats  at  any  time 
without  asking  permission,  for  they  didn't  have 
any  seats,"  except  little,  light,  movable  chairs  and 
half  of  them  sat  on  the  floor.  The  instructions  of 
the  principal  to  the  teachers,  in  his  own  words  were: 
"Keep  the  youngsters  busy,  but  don't  let  them  learn 
anything  if  you  can  help  it!" 

Each  child  was  allowed  to  chose  from  the  well- 
stored  toy  and  book  closets  of  the  room  what- 
ever toy,  game,  working  material,  book,  or  pictures 
he  wished;  and  then  shown  how  to  make  use  of 
them.  A  busier  pair  than  those  two  teachers 
during  school  hours  could  hardly  be  imagined! 
The  first  result  was  that  the  children  promptly 
stopped  having  incessant  colds  in  their  heads 
and  snufHes  and  sore  throats,  and  grew  rosy  and 
active  and  happy.  The  second  that  about  three 
months  from  the  beginning  of  the  term,  one  of 
the  teachers  came  to  the  principal  and  reported 
that  some  fifteen  children,  whom  she  named,  in 
her  room  were  now  ready  to  be  promoted  to  the 
second  grade.  Quick  as  a  flash  snapped  the  reply, 
with  a  reassuring  twinkle  in  the  eye  of  the  prin- 


BRICK  WALLS  AND  GROWING  CHILD  179 

cipal:  "If  you  tell  that  to  anybody  else  you'll 
lose  your  job.  Go  right  on  with  the  performance. " 

No  child  was  obliged  to  enter  these  open-air 
rooms  if  his  parents  objected,  as  not  a  few  of 
them  did  at  first;  but  before  the  term  was  half 
over,  they  were  coming  to  the  school  to  beg  that 
their  little  ones  might  be  taken  from  the  closed- 
up  rooms  and  put  into  the  windowless  ones.  Before 
the  Easter  vacation  was  reached,  it  was  decided 
to  apply  the  method  to  two  other  grades;  and 
one  of  the  higher  grades  having  petitioned  that 
their  rooms  should  be  turned  into  open-air  ones, 
a  pavilion  was  constructed  upon  the  roof  of  the 
school  for  their  use  the  sides  of  which  were  made  up 
of  curtains  and  movable  sash.  Now  out  of  eighteen 
rooms  in  the  building,  sixteen  are  open-air. 

When  asked  how  much  farther  the  plan  could 
be  profitably  carried,  the  pioneer  principal  exclaimed : 
"The  next  time  I  can  find  a  school  board  that  will 
build  me  a  school  just  as  I  want  it,  I'll  have  them 
build  me  a  barn,  with  sheds  and  a  barnyard!" 

In  fine,  no  school  can  be  considered  complete 
that  does  not  include  a  large  playground,  school 
garden  and  group  of  sheds  and  shops.  The  most 
important  and  vital  part  of  a  school  is  not  its  school- 
house,  but  its  grounds.  At  first  sight  the  expense 
of  such  a  plan  would  appear  to  be  prohibitive,  but 
in  reality  it  is  far  from  being  so.  It  would  cost 
money  of  course,  like  everything  under  the  sun  that 


i8o  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

is  worth  having,  but  in  small  towns  and  country 
districts  this  additional  expense  would  be  com- 
paratively slight;  while  in  larger  towns  and  cities 
quite  an  appreciable  share  of  the  additional  money 
needed  for  the  grounds  could  be  saved  on  the  build- 
ing. The  ideal  schoolroom  is  not  a  mere  architec- 
tural triumph,  nor  an  imposing  monument  to  the 
memory  of  the  schoolboard,  solid  and  massive  as  an 
asylum  or  a  prison,  but  an  inexpensively  con- 
structed, light,  roomy,  day-nursery,  never  exceeding 
two  stones  in  height,  or  one  room  and  a  corridor  in 
breadth,  with  broad  staircases,  wide  hallways  and 
at  least  one  third  to  one  half  the  wall  space  of  each 
room  in  the  shape  of  movable  window  sash,  or  shut- 
ters, so  that  it  can  be  converted  into  a  porch,  or 
shed,  in  fine  weather.  Thoughtful  students  of  the 
growth  of  the  child  are  coming  to  much  the  same 
conclusion  as  experts  have  come  to  in  regard  to  sana- 
toria for  tuberculosis,  that  every  dollar  spent  in 
constructing  a  building  in  excess  of  about  one 
hundred  and  fifty  dollars  per  patient  is  wasted,  and 
worse!  From  a  sanitary  point  of  view,  whatever  is 
spent  above  a  certain  minimum  sum  upon  a  building 
is  spent  in  overcoming  the  fact  that  it  is  a  building, 
and  keeping  it  light,  airy  and  sunny  enough  for 
human  use. 

The  logical  result  of  our  ancient  habit  of  making 
the  schoolroom  a  place  to  keep  children  out  of 
mischief,  and  teach  them  something  to  keep  their 


BRICK  WALLS  AND  GROWING  CHILD  181 

minds  employed,  is  now  to  be  seen  in  our  schools. 
It  is  not  too  much  to  say  that  our  present  system 
is  literally  on  trial  for  its  life.  On  every  hand  come 
complaints  from  merchants  and  business  men  that 
graduates  of  the  schools  are  useless,  unpractical, 
living  in  a  world  of  theory;  expecting  to  start  with  a 
salary  of  one  hundred  dollars  a  month  and  actually 
worth  about  three  a  week. 

The  almost  unanimous  testimony  of  practical  men 
is  that  the  pupils  have  to  be  taken  in  hand  and 
entirely  reeducated  from  the  bottom  up;  and  the 
farther  they  have  gone  in  the  course  the  more 
radical  must  this  recasting  be. 

From  the  family  physician  comes  the  complaint 
that  the  school  terms  of  the  year  are  the  times  of 
headaches,  of  anemias,  of  epidemics  of  infectious 
diseases,  of  malnutrition,  of  nervous  irritability, 
of  capricious  temper,  and  of  general  physical  and 
mental  depression. 

The  hours  of  the  school  are  so  long,  the  air  so 
bad,  the  discipline  enforced  as  to  prevention  of 
movement  and  assumption  of  cramped  and  un- 
natural attitudes  so  absurd  and  irrational,  that  it 
would  be  hard  to  discover  a  child  who  is  in  any 
way  improved,  physically,  by  the  schoolroom,  and 
almost  as  difficult  to  find  one  who  is  not  injured 
by  it. 

From  the  parent,  the  public-spirited  student  of 
humanity,  and  the  tax-payer  combined,  comes  the 


i82  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

complaint  that  something  like  forty  to  sixty  per  cent, 
of  all  our  children  leave  school  between  fourteen  and 
sixteen  years  of  age;  and  that  many  of  them  would 
do  so  earlier  were  they  not  restrained  by  the  pres- 
sure of  public  opinion  and  the  child-labour  laws. 
This  is  not  because  they  are  compelled  to  earn  a 
living,  but  chiefly  because  they  have  lost  all  in- 
terest and  find  no  profit  or  nutrition  in  the  highly 
clerical,  anemic  and  lady-like  instruction  and  mental 
pabulum  which  is  placed  before  them  after  the 
fourteenth  year. 

It  is  not  that  the  child  is  passing  through  a  period 
of  special  restlessness,  but  that  this  is  the  first  time 
when  he  begins  to  assert  his  individuality  and  to 
realize  how  artificial,  absurd,  and  unsatisfactory  are 
the  tasks  imposed  upon  him  by  the  schoolroom. 
The  community  maintains,  at  an  enormous  expense, 
high  schools  for  the  use  of  all  classes  of  its  children. 
Two  thirds  of  this  expense  is  borne  by  the  less  fav- 
oured social  classes,  while  nine  tenths  of  the  children 
of  these  classes  and  over  half  of  the  children  of  all 
classes  are  dropped  and  shaken  and  chilled  out  of 
the  superb  curriculum  at,  or  before,  the  beginning 
of  the  high  school. 

To  put  it  roughly,  all  the  community  is  taxed  to 
support  schools  for  the  benefit  of  the  children  of 
less  than  one  third;  which  situation  comes  about 
almost  solely  on  account  of  the  uselessness,  pedan- 
try, and  unpracticalness  of  the  subjects  taught  in 


BRICK  WALLS  AND  GROWING  CHILD  183 

these  schools,  or  of  the  methods  by  which  they  are 
taught. 

Further,  •  from  expert  students  of  the  school 
situation  has  come  of  late  the  discovery  that  in  the 
great  cities  of  our  country  from  fifteen  to  thirty-five 
per  cent,  of  the  children  are  retarded  —  that  is  to  say, 
from  two  to  four  years  behind  their  grades.  Which 
means  that  nearly  one  fifth  of  the  total  money  ex- 
pended upon  our  schools  is  being  wasted  in  teaching 
this  proportion  of  the  children  the  same  thing  two 
or  three  times  over  in  successive  years. 

In  some  of  the  schools  of  New  York  City  investi- 
gated, so  ill-suited,  unfitted  to  the  capacity  of  the 
children  was  the  instruction  that  in  some  of  the 
rooms  and  grades  there  were  actually  children  who 
had  been  going  to  school  since  before  other  children 
in  that  room  were  born!  A  more  eloquent  comment 
upon  the  utter  lack  of  fitness,  of  interest,  and  of 
growth  value  of  our  curriculum  for  the  average 
child  could  hardly  be  imagined. 

What  is  to  be  done?  In  the  opinion  of  the  most 
careful  and  loving  students  of  the  child  and  of 
his  needs,  nothing  less  is  demanded  than  an  abso- 
lute recasting  of  our  entire  educational  system, 
moulding  it  to  fit  the  needs  of  the  child,  to  pro- 
mote at  every  point  his  interests,  his  growth  and 
his  health,  instead  of  antagonizing  them  two  thirds 
of  the  time,  as  it  does  now;  to  make  his  education 
fit  in  both  with  his  previous  life  and  development 


1 84  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

before  he  enters  school  and  with  the  world  and  life 
in  which  he  is  to  live,  after  he  leaves  school.  We 
take  a  young  child  now,  and  break  him  in  to  the 
schoolroom,  training  him  to  breathe  an  entirely  new 
and  artificial  atmosphere,  ai  if  we  were  to  turn  a  frog 
into  a  fish.  Then,  after  preserving  him  with  great 
care  and  pains  in  this  gold-fish  bowl  for  ten  years, 
we  throw  him  gasping  out  on  to  the  bank  to  learn 
to  breathe  air  again  and  completely  recast  his  scheme 
and  ideas  of  life,  in  order  to  fit  himself  for  the  world 
in  which  he  finds  himself. 

If  we  deliberately  took  pains  to  unfit  a  child  for 
real  life,  we  could  hardly  improve  upon  our  pres- 
ent school  system.  For  investigation  we  substitute 
memory;  for  initiative,  tame  obedience  to  authority; 
for  self-activity,  parrot-like  imitation;  for  doing, 
talking;  and  for  things,  words.  Then  we  wonder 
why  he  is  not  practical  and  properly  fitted  for  the 
battle  of  life ! 

The  main  aim  of  our  system  of  education  is 
superiority  instead  of  service.  It  tends  to  make  a 
select,  superior,  cultured  class,  who  shall  be  more 
or  less  borne  upon  the  backs  and  shoulders  of 
the  uncultured  mass  of  the  people;  to  breed  prigs 
and  parasites  instead  of  men  and  women. 

The  training  appropriate  for  those  two  purely  orna- 
mental and,  on  the  whole  expensive  and  undesirable 
parasites,  the  Gentleman  and  the  Scholar,  still  domi- 
nates too  much  of  our  school  curriculum.  The  ideally 


BRICK  WALLS  AND  GROWING  CHILD  185 

educated  man  still  is  to  be  in  the  world,  but  not  of 
it  —  a  chosen  stratum,  a  special  priesthood  of  cul- 
ture and  superiority. 

How  are  we  going  to  square  our  education  with 
the  facts  of  life,  and  prepare  the  child  for  this 
world  instead  of  the  next? 


CHAPTER  X 

EYES   AND    EARS 

ONE  of  the  most  singular  characteristics  of 
humanity  is  its  dread  of  the  new  and  the 
untried.  We  boast  ourselves  a  progressive 
race,  and  yet  we  are  always  looking  backward,  with 
longing,  and  even  regret.  We  have  survived  and 
triumphed  gloriously  in  the  past,  but  —  heaven 
only  knows  what  we  are  coming  to  in  the  future! 
The  old  days  were  the  good  days,  and  the  long  days. 
The  present  are  the  short,  and  the  evil.  Especially 
are  we  afraid  of  the  conditions  which  we  have 
created  ourselves,  and  which  we  call  civilization. 
Savagery  was  full  of  primitive  vigour  and  of 
childhood's  joy  in  existence  for  its  own  sake. 
Barbarism  throbbed  with  the  hot  pulses  of  love 
and  the  lust  of  battle,  while  civilization  is  the 
"lean  and  slippered  pantaloon"  of  later  middle 
life,  sure  to  blunt  the  senses  and  to  chill  the 
pulses.  Forgetting  among  a  thousand  other  facts} 
that  the  favourite  occupation  of  civilization  which 
we  call  colonization  has  been  the  sending  forth  of 
our  least  successful,  headed  by  our  most  restless 
and  ill-balanced,  to  beat  the  Savage  and  the  Bar- 

186 


EYES  AND  EARS  187 

barian  at  his  own  game,  and  wipe  him  off  the  face 
of  the  earth. 

Nowhere  is  our  dread  of  civilized  conditions  more 
vividly  exemplified  than  in  our  apprehension  as  to 
their  effects  upon  those  wonderfully  delicate  and 
exquisite  mechanisms,  our  special  senses,  and 
particularly  those  of  sight  and  hearing.  No  com- 
moner plaint  is  heard  upon  every  hand  than  that 
we  are  becoming  a  race  of  spectacle  wearers,  that 
our  children  are  born  short-sighted,  and  that  our 
sight  and  hearing  are  breaking  down  under  the 
terrific  strains  of  civilized  life. 

We  seem  to  have  good  reason  and  evidence 
for  this  pessimistic  belief.  On  every  hand,  grave 
and  reverend  seniors  assure  us  that  nobody  ever 
dreamed  of  wearing  "specs"  before  they  were  gray- 
headed  in  their  time,  and  now  we  put  them  upon 
babies  as  soon  as  they  can  toddle.  Fifty  years  ago, 
such  a  thing  as  "eye-strain"  was  never  heard  of. 
Now  it  is  one  of  the  most  fashionable  complaints, 
a  mark  of  intellectuality  and  culture.  Examination 
of  the  eyes  of  our  school-children  reveals  the  horri- 
fying fact  that  from  fifteen  per  cent,  to  twenty-five 
per  cent,  of  them  present  defects  which  need  glasses 
for  their  correction.  And  in  Germany,  at  least,  this 
percentage  increases  from  the  lower  through  the 
higher  grades.  Even  those  who  escape  the  grosser 
defects  can  nearly  always  discover,  if  they  examine 
closely  enough,  that  they  have  some  trace  of  astig- 


i88 

matism  and  are  thus  qualified  for  brevet-rank  in 
our  modern  aristocracy  of  defectives. 

Moreover,  from  every  printing  office  and  pressroom 
are  pouring  forth  floods  of  newspapers,  illustrated 
magazines,  books  and  pamphlets  which  we  must 
master,  or  at  least  glance  over,  or  fall  behind  the 
procession,  and  thus  complete  the  ruin  of  our 
already  weakened  and  overstrained  optics.  In  ad- 
dition, we  have  floods  of  corroborative  evidence  as  to 
the  decadence  of  all  our  other  senses  and  powers. 
We  have  practically  lost  our  sense  of  smell  as  com- 
pared with  the  savage  who  can  track  the  fox  un- 
aided in  the  dewy  morning.  Our  teeth  are  decaying 
before  they  have  got  fairly  set  in  our  heads.  Our 
ears  have  become  dulled  and  stunned  by  the  roar 
and  the  clamour  of  our  workshops  and  our  city 
streets.  Our  heads  are  coming  through  our  hair 
before  we  have  got  fairly  settled  in  life,  and  alto- 
gether, our  boasted  cephalic  extremity  is  a  deplor- 
able spectacle  of  decay. 

All  of  which  literally  baffling  presentment,  how- 
ever, is  based  upon  one  common  foundation,  and 
that  is  the  one  so  frankly  given  by  the  great 
Doctor  Johnson  for  one  of  his  few  mistakes  in 
definition  in  his  famous  dictionary.  When  asked, 
with  a  polite  simper,  by  a  lady  of  literary  preten- 
sions: 

"What,  Doctor,  led  you  to  define  versatility  in 
such  a  way?" 


EYES  AND  EARS  189 

"Ignorance,  ma'am,  pure  gnorance!"  thundered 
the  doctor. 

Our  certainty  that  modern  eyes,  ears,  teeth,  etc., 
are  decadent,  is  in  direct  ratio  to  our  picturesque 
and  profound  ignorance  of  their  exact  condition  in 
the  savage.  The  noble  savage  is  a  myth.  Instead 
of  being  a  model  of  physical  perfection,  he  was 
undersized,  narrow-chested,  short-lived,  and  with  a 
perfectly  enormous  mortality.  The  average  savage 
tribe  in  the  open  has  a  death  rate  of  from  one  and  a 
half  times  to  double  that  of  our  slum  populations. 
There  is  no  disease  or  defect  known  to  civilization 
to  which  he  is  not  subject,  except  certain  of  the 
infectious  diseases.  And  when  these  latter  reach 
him,  they  mow  him  down  like  grass  before  the  scythe. 
Competent  dentists  who  have  examined  collections 
of  savage  crania,  discover  every  form  of  decay  of 
the  teeth  and  of  disease  of  the  gums  which  are 
known  under  civilization,  and  in  almost  the  same 
proportion.  The  keenness  of  his  sight,  his  smell 
and  his  hearing  are  simply  the  result  of  incessant 
and  inescapable  training,  living  in  the  constant 
atmosphere  of  danger  and  of  suspicion.  If  he  did 
not  keep  his  senses  strained  to  the  utmost  and 
stretched  for  the  faintest  intimation  of  danger,  he 
could  never  have  survived.  We  have  let  some  of 
our  senses  lapse  somewhat  under  the  slothful  se- 
curity of  civilization,  particularly  that  of  smell, 
which  might  properly  be  described  as  one  of  the  lost 


WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

arts.  But  we  can  reacquire  them,  not  merely  in  a 
generation,  but  in  half  of  a  single  lifetime,  as  hun- 
dreds of  white  trappers,  drovers  and  hunters  have 
abundantly  proved. 

Now  as  to  his  eyesight  and  hearing.  Here  the 
proposition  is  somewhat  less  definite,  for  the  vivid 
and  striking  reason  that  the  savage  boy  or  girl  never 
had  to  learn  to  read,  since  they  had  no  books.  If 
our  modern  boys  and  girls  were  allowed  to  grow  up 
as  did  the  savages,  reading  only  the  book  of  nature, 
we  should  hear  very  little  of  eyestrain.  Even 
if  defects  were  present,  they  would  never  be  dis- 
covered. The  savage  uses  his  eyes  at  least  three 
fourths  of  the  time  at  long  range,  and  for  large  or 
moving  objects  —  the  flight  of  birds  through  the 
tree-tops,  the  trout  at  the  bottom  of  the  pool,  the 
deer  in  the  brush,  the  band  of  horsemen  sweeping 
across  the  prairie.  Even  when  he  becomes  a  student 
of  art,  his  pictures  are  drawn  with  a  charred  stick 
or  a  chunk  of  yellow  ochre;  and  such  writings  as  he 
possessed  are  pictographs  which  can  be  read  at 
fifty  feet  from  horseback.  The  only  close  work 
to  be  done  is  in  such  odds  and  ends  of  time  as 
he  spends  in  shaping  and  polishing  his  weapons, 
or  in  tattooing  himself  or  his  comrades.  Of 
course  the  savage  woman  has  her  fancy  work. 
She  wouldn't  be  feminine  if  she  didn't.  But  her 
needles  are  the  size  of  a  brad-awl,  and  her 
threads  like  whipcord,  so  that  the  resulting  pat- 


EYES  AND  EARS  191 

terns  can  be  readily  worked  on  at  the  full  length 
of  the  arm. 

Civilized  man,  on  the  other  hand,  uses  his  eyes 
for  the  deciphering  of  tiny  little  letters,  strung  in 
straight  lines  like  buds  on  a  stalk  —  for  a  total  of 
hours  every  day  of  his  life,  and  often  eight  hours  at 
a  stretch.  No  wonder  that  the  eye  which  the  savage 
found  perfect  for  his  purposes  is  discovered  to  be 
inadequate  for  modern  use. 

In  short,  practically  the  only  basis  that  we  have 
for  our  oft  repeated  and  firm  conviction  that  the 
civilized  eye  is  inferior  to  the  savage  is  the  fact  that 
the  savage,  or  inherited,  eye  will  not  do  civilized 
work  without  assistance.  When  that  assistance  is 
given  the  eye  becomes,  with  intelligent  use,  ade- 
quate to  its  new  task.  And  we  have  no  valid 
proof  that  the  civilized  eye  has  become  any  weaker 
or  less  adequate  during  the  past  hundred  years. 
Moreover,  we  now  have  a  number  of  indications 
tending  to  show  that  the  savage  eye  is  defective  in 
the  same  wayt  if  not  to  the  same  degree,  that  the 
civilized  one  is.  First  of  all,  that  from  fifty  to 
seventy  per  cent,  of  all  children  of  whatever  grade 
in  society  or  nationality  examined,  shortly  after 
birth,  are  found  to  be  born  slightly  long-sighted, 
which  is  far  the  commonest  defect  for  which  glasses 
are  worn.  So  that  all  that  the  strains  of  later  life 
do  is  to  reveal  this  already  congenital  defect. 
Second,  that  such  examinations  as  have  been  made 


i92  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

of  Indian  and  Negro  children  show  about  the  same 
percentage  of  long-sightedness,  though  less  of  the 
opposite  defect,  short  sight.  Third  that  examina- 
tions of  the  eyes  of  thousands  of  school  children  in 
all  countries  show  as  high  a  grade  of  long  sight  among 
the  children  of  ignorant  and  illiterate  peasants  and 
artisans  as  among  those  of  the  most  intelligent  and 
cultured  classes  who  have  been  readers  for  five  or 
six  generations,  and  a  much  higher  degree  of  defects 
due  to  diseases  of  the  eye.  Fourth,  that  all  races  of 
whom  we  have  any  knowledge  see  the  stars  as 
star-shaped,  cross-like,  or  radiating  bodies.  This 
star,  or  rayed  shape,  is  due  to  astigmatism.  If  our 
eyes  were  perfectly  free  from  this  defect,  the  stars 
would  appear  to  us  as  tiny,  perfectly  round  points 
of  light,  like  miniature  suns  or  moons.  No  race, 
however  nobly  savage,  has  ever  considered  "star- 
shaped"  the  equivalent  of  round. 

Still  every  reader  of  his  Cooper  knows  that  a 
savage  has  "eyes  like  a  hawk";  while  every  town 
dweller  is  by  comparison  "blind  as  a  bat."  But 
careful  experiments  and  repeated  practical  tests 
have  shown  that  this  difference  is  not  in  keenness 
of  vision,  but  in  skill  in  interpreting  what  is  seen. 
The  city  man  sees,  for  instance,  precisely  the  same 
brown  and  yellow  blurs  upon  a  brown,  yellow  and 
purple  background  that  the  savage  does,  and  just 
as  vividly.  Only  he  doesn't  know  that  which 
means  deer,  which  the  savage,  by  daily  and  hourly 


EYES  AND  EARS  193 

incessant  training  from  childhood,  has  learned  to 
recognize. 

The  hawk,  it  may  be  remarked  in  passing,  is  a 
much  overrated  bird  in  this,  as  in  several  other 
respects.  And  his  most  affectionate  students  are 
now  of  the  opinion  that  he  doesn't  see  any  farther, 
sharper,  or  better  than  we  do,  but  owes  his  undoubted 
quickness  in  detecting  game  or  an  enemy  to  the  alti- 
tude of  his  position,  his  unobstructed  view,  and  to 
the  fact  that  his  two  eyes  work  separately,  and  don't 
bother  to  try  to  get  together  in  binocular  vision. 
So  that  he  covers  the  whole  face  of  the  horizon 
except  a  small  arc  directly  behind  the  back  of  his 
head.  Only  keep  perfectly  still,  and  match  your 
surroundings  sufficiently  closely  not  actually  to 
swear  at  them,  and  the  hawk  will  sweep  and  flutter 
over  you  less  than  thirty  yards  in  the  air,  without 
ever  detecting  your  presence. 

The  human  eye  is  as  good  a  piece  of  optical 
apparatus  as  anything  that  walks  or  swims  or  flies, 
and  infinitely  more  dependable  than  most.  The 
average  farm-bred  white  man  can  in  a  few  years' 
practice  in  the  open  learn  to  see  the  partridge 
among  the  dead  leaves,  the  quail  in  the  stubble 
and  the  deer  on  the  hillside,  just  as  quickly  and 
as  instinctively  as  the  Indian,  though  every  sound, 
every  rustle,  every  shift  of  the  light,  change  of 
colour,  or  puff  of  air  speaks  directly  to  the  Indian, 
without  his  having  to  stop  and  rcr.son  about  it  in 


I94  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

a  way  that  it  takes  decades  for  a  white  man  to 
grow  into. 

We  may  therefore,  face  the  problem  calmly, 
secure  in  the  thought  that  we  have  no  adequate 
evidence  that  any  process  of  decadence  has  as  yet 
set  in,  or  that  the  human  eye  has  as  yet  been  seriously 
harmed  or  shown  any  sign  of  giving  way  under  the 
strain  of  civilization. 

The  dangers  to  which  the  modern  eye  is  exposed, 
fall  into  two  great  classes;  disease  and  overuse  from 
near  work.  Here  another  great  consoling  fact 
faces  us,  and  that  is  that,  while  overwork  and  con- 
sequent eyestrain  are  far  the  commonest  troubles 
that  befall  the  modern  eye,  discomfort  and  ineffi- 
ciency are  as  far  as  they  are  able  to  go  in  ninety-nine 
cases  out  of  one  hundred.  Never  yet  was  an  eye  lost 
solely  from  eyestrain.  Practically  all  blindness  is  due 
to  disease,  and  not  to  overwork.  More  significant 
yet,  seven  tenths  of  the  diseases  which  produce  blind- 
ness are  the  acute  infections,  small-pox,  granular 
ophthalmia,  or  trachoma,  gonorrhoea  and  syphilis. 
Against  these  civilization  wages  an  unceasing  and 
victorious  conflict.  Small-pox  it  has  practically 
overcome,  thanks  to  vaccination.  Trachoma  is 
rapidly  disappearing,  except  from  our  slums,  and 
our  most  ignorant  and  degraded  peasant  popula- 
tions. Gonorrhoea  and  syphillis  alone  hold  their 
own  as  "blinders,"  on  account  of  our  highly  intel- 
ligent amblyopia  in  declining  to  recognize  them 


EYES  AND  EARS  195 

officially  or  mention  them  in  public.  Just  so  long  as 
we  continue  to  consider  it  immodest  and  improper 
to  discuss  these  last  two  blights,  so  long  they  will 
continue  to  put  out  the  eyes  of  little  children  by  the 
thousand.  The  danger,  then,  of  total  blindness,  is 
less  under  civilization  than  ever  before.  One  hun- 
dred years  ago,  from  forty  to  sixty  per  cent,  of 
those  who  were  in  the  blind  asylums  were  there  on 
account  of  small-pox.  Now  vaccination  has  reduced 
their  percentage  to  less  than  two  per  cent. 

The  percentage  of  blindness  from  trachoma  has 
enormously  diminished,  while  to-day,  the  lion's 
share  of  the  population  of  our  blind  asylums  belongs 
to  gonorrhoea,  with  syphilis  a  fair  second.  In 
the  different  asylums  in  this  country  and  in  Europe, 
from  fifteen  to  forty  per  cent,  of  the  inmates  are 
put  there  by  gonorrhoea;  yet  we  do  nothing  publicly 
to  stop  it,  because  it  isn't  "modest!"  No  known 
disease  which  causes  blindness  is  increasing  under 
civilization.  So  that  when  we  do  finally  come  to  our 
senses  and  fight  all  diseases  alike,  as  we  surely  will, 
we  have  good  right  confidently  to  expect  that 
blindness  will  be  practically  abolished,  or  reduced 
to  less  than  five  per  cent,  of  its  present  frequency. 

Even  the  risk  of  blindness  from  accidental  causes, 
such  as  wounds,  blows,  scaldings,  and  burnings 
is  very  much  less  than  it  was  before,  and  still  dimin- 
ishing, on  account  of  the  enormously  increased  power 
of  curing  wounds  of  the  eye  placed  in  our  hands  by 


196  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

antisepsis  and  asepsis.  Where  ten  eyes  were  lost 
by  wounds  becoming  infected,  less  than  one  eye  is 
now  lost. 

Only  one  form  of  blindness  can  be  fairly  said  to 
be  becoming  more  common,  and  that  is  cataract. 
While  this  is  becoming  more  common,  because  a 
larger  percentage  of  people  are  living  to  the  age 
when  it  naturally  occurs,  yet  the  actual  blindness 
caused  by  it  has  been  almost  wiped  out  by  the 
delicacy  and  perfection  of  the  operation  which  has 
been  devised  for  its  cure.  Nine  tenths  of  all  cases 
of  cataract  can  be  given  good  working  vision  for 
both  reading  and  distance,  by  removing  the  opaque 
lens  and  replacing  it  by  lenses  of  glass,  properly 
adjusted  and  worn  as  spectacles,  in  front  of  the  eye, 
instead  of  inside  it. 

I  almost  hesitate  to  apply  the  term  "disease"  to 
this  curious  process,  which  is  really  a  form  of  matur- 
ation or  ripening,  and  has,  in  its  ordinary  form,  noth- 
ing to  do  with  disease,  or  conditions  of  the  health. 
It  is  a  singular  and  most  interesting  process.  To 
put  it  very  crudely,  a  little  ball  of  cells  has  formed 
itself  in  the  centre  of  eye,  for  the  purpose  of  acting 
as  a  lens  or  focuser  of  the  light  rays.  In  order  to 
do  this  perfectly,  it  had  to  become  absolutely  trans- 
parent. And  as  blood  vessels,  of  even  the  most  hair- 
like  delicacy  are  opaque,  it,  so  to  speak,  surrendered 
its  birthright  in  this  regard  and  became  entirely 
dependent  upon  the  absorption  of  fluids  from  the 


EYES  AND  EARS  197 

surrounding  tissues  of  the  eye  —  the  iris,  choroid 
and  vitreous  body.  Unfortunately,  however,  under 
these  conditions  its  only  method  of  growth  possible 
is  from  without,  by  additions  to  its  surface,  just  like 
a  tree  trunk,  or  a  plant  stem.  And  after  a  time  this 
process  of  steady  deposit  of  new  material  upon  the 
outer  surface  reaches  a  point  where  it  completely 
cuts  off  from  an  adequate  supply  of  nutriment  the 
cells  in  the  centre  of  the  mass.  These  slowly  die  at 
a  period  anywhere  from  the  fifty-fifth  to  the  seven- 
tieth year,  undergo  fatty  degeneration,  and  become 
opaque,  and  behold  cataract  is  formed. 

This  little  body  that  we  have  been  describing, 
the  crystalline  lens  of  the  eye,  is  in  fact  a  plant-like 
organism  in  an  animal  body,  and  like  the  plant  it 
ultimately  reaches  a  point  at  which  it  begins  to 
decay  at  the  heart. 

The  operation  for  cataract  is  simplicity  itself, 
merely  an  incision  with  a  very  delicate  knife,  un- 
der strictest  aseptic  precautions,  through  the  coats 
of  the  eyeball.  A  little  cutting  with  a  sharp  hook 
or  delicate  pair  of  scissors,  to  liberate  the  lens  from 
the  iris  and  its  capsule,  gentle  pressure  upon  the 
ball  of  the  eye,  and,  pop!  up  comes  the  opaque 
and  useless  lens,  leaving  the  eyeball  perfectly  trans- 
parent once  more.  All  that  remains  to  be  done  is 
to  put  a  lens  of  similar  strength  in  the  frame  of  a  pair 
of  spectacles,  and  hang  it  before  the  eye,  to  take  the 
place  of  the  lens  removed. 


198  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

With  all  our  ingenuity  however,  we  can  only 
imitate  Nature  at  a  distance,  as  it  were.  And  as 
this  new  lens  is  glass,  and  cannot  adjust  itself,  or, 
as  the  term  is,  accommodate  "for  near  vision,"  we 
have  to  have  a  second  stronger  glass  to  read  with, 
and  sometimes  a  third  for  very  close  work.  With 
these  lenses  however,  the  man  who  has  had  his 
cataract  successfully  removed,  can  count  upon 
anywhere  from  half  to  three  quarters  of  full  vision, 
which  is  abundant  for  all  practical  purposes. 

This  brings  us  to  the  fact  that  a  large  share  of  our 
troubles  with  our  eyes  in  modern  times  is  due,  like 
cataract,  to  the  fact  that  we  have  got  into  the  in- 
veterate habit  of  outliving  them,  as  well  as  our 
teeth,  our  hair  and  our  hearing,  and  of  this  we  ob- 
stinately refuse  to  break  ourselves.  Nature  doesn't 
borrow  any  trouble  before  she  comes  to  it.  And  as 
the  average  savage  lived  only  about  thirty  years, 
Nature  built  his  eye  to  last  forty  to  forty-five, 
giving  him  a  liberal  margin  of  fifty  per  cent.  Then 
we  blame  her,  because  this  eye  that  was  loaded  to 
carry  for  forty-five  years,  will  not  go  passively  on 
and  do  all  that  is  required  of  it  till  sixty,  seventy  or 
even  seventy-five  years  of  age. 

When  we  are  willing  to  reform  our  bad  habit  of 
living  too  long,  to  abandon  our  "bloodthirsty  clinging 
to  life,"  as  Matthew  Arnold  called  it,  we  shall  find 
less  reason  to  complain  of  our  eyes  and  ears. 

Now,  as  to  that  hydra-headed  monster,  eyestrain, 


EYES  AND  EARS  199 

the  dragon  which  is  apt  to  devour  the  eyesight  of  the 
civilized  races.  This  is  almost  entirely  dependent 
upon  a  series  of  oversights  on  the  part  of  Mother 
Nature  in  not  making  all  our  eyes  just  the  proper 
shape.  She  is  still  unfortunately  "trying  her 
'prentice  hand  on  man,"  and  the  lassies  as  well.  The 
sole  purpose  of  the  shape  and  clear  parts  of  the 
human  eye  cornea,  lens  and  vitreous  body — is  to  act 
as  a  lens  which  will  bring  rays  to  a  focus  on  the 
retina  at  the  back  of  the  eye.  As  all  light-rays  com- 
ing from  objects  more  than  twenty  feet  away  are 
practically  parallel,  and  these  constitute  nine  tenths 
of  a  savage's  range  of  vision,  the  eye  is  made  with  a 
lens  of  such  shape  and  thickness  that  it  will,  when 
at  rest,  bring  parallel  rays  to  a  focus  upon  the 
retina,  without  effort.  This  is  what  has  been  termed 
the  emmetropic,  or  normal  eye.  But  unfortunately, 
this  normal  eye,  like  a  good  many  other  normal 
things,  is  only  a  figure  of  speech.  And  from  fifty 
to  sixty  per  cent  of  us  are  born  with  eyes  which  will 
not  bring  parallel  rays  to  a  focus  without  the  as- 
sistance of  a  little  muscular  effort.  In  other  words, 
the  average  eye  is  what  we  term  hypermetropic,  or 
long-sighted. 

Here  comes  in  however,  the  really  masterly  piece 
of  mechanism  in  the  human  eye,  which  atones  for  all 
the  purely  optical  defects  of  that  organ,  and  makes  it 
one  of  the  most  wonderful  "scopes"  in  the  world, 
ranging  all  the  way  from  the  distant  range  of  the 


200  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

telescope  to  the  minute  accuracy  of  a  weak  micro- 
scope, and  that  is  the  so  called  "power  of  accomo- 
dation. "  The  precise  mechanism  is  too  elaborate 
for  description  without  a  detailed  knowledge  of  the 
anatomy  of  the  eye.  But  the  principle  is  simplicity 
itself,  viz.,  that  by  the  contraction  of  a  small  cir- 
cular muscle,  the  so-called  ciliary  muscle  —  the 
crystalline  lens,  the  body  involved  in  cataract,  is 
made  to  become  more  bulging  from  before  backward, 
and  hence  increases  the  converging  power  of  the 
eye,  so  that  even  rays  which  are  not  parallel,  but 
divergent,  can  be  brought  to  a  focus  upon  the  retina. 

Even  this  power  of  course  has  its  limits,  as  you 
can  readily  test  for  yourself,  by  focusing  upon  the 
tip  of  your  finger  at  full  arm's  length  for  instance, 
and  rapidly  approaching  it  toward  the  face,  when 
it  will  be  found  to  become  blurred  at  a  certain  point 
whose  distance  from  the  eye  will  vary  according  to 
your  age  and  the  power  of  your  ciliary  muscle.  In 
childhood  this  "near  point,"  may  be  as  close  as  four 
or  five  inches;  but  by  middle  life,  it  will  usually  have 
receded  to  about  twelve  or  fourteen. 

Now,  supposing  that  you  are  born,  as  most  of 
us  ape,  with  an  eye  that  requires  a  slight  muscular 
effort  in  order  to  focus  parallel  or  distant  rays  upon 
the  retina.  It  is  of  course,  obvious  that  when  we 
have  habitually  used  that  eye  for  hours  at  a  stretch 
and  seven  days  in  the  week  upon  objects  from  one  to 
three  feet  distant,  the  rays  from  which  are  markedly 


EYES  AND  EARS  201 

divergent,  that  this  muscle  is  going  to  become 
overtired.  When  this  is  the  case,  what  is  to  be  done? 
If  the  defect  of  the  eye  be  only  slight  in  degree,  as 
fortunately  it  is  in  the  majority  of  cases,  it  will  be 
sufficient  to  moderate  the  amount  of  near  work  to 
within  reasonable  limits,  to  take  the  best  and  most 
intelligent  precautions  as  to  the  amount  and  the 
direction  of  the  light  by  which  the  work  is  done,  to 
give  the  eye  plenty  of  work  for  distant  purposes, 
in  order  to  arouse  it  and  restore  its  tone,  and  to  keep 
both  eye  and  system  in  good  physical  condition. 
When,  however,  this  defect  of  the  eye  goes  beyond  a 
certain  degree,  these  measures  are  inefficient;  and 
as  it  consists  solely  in  a  slight  flattening  of  the  eye, 
we  have  at  our  disposal  a  mechanical  remedy,  in 
the  shape  of  a  lens  or  glass,  whose  bulge,  or  thick- 
ness in  the  centre,  is  equivalent  to  the  degree  of 
flattening  of  the  eye.  When  we  put  a  lens  in  front 
of  the  eye  for  the  correction  of  long  sight,  the  defect 
that  calls  for  certainly  half  to  two  thirds  of  all  the 
spectacles  that  are  worn,  we  are  simply  correcting 
an  oversight  on  nature's  part,  and  giving  the  eye 
a  new  power.  We  are  not  doing  the  eye  the  slightest 
damage.  On  the  contrary,  we  are  saving  it  from  a 
painful  and  crippling  strain,  which  will  last  the  whole 
lifetime  of  the  individual.  Instead  of  the  eye  be- 
coming old  sooner  from  wearing  glasses,  it  will 
retain  its  youth  for  a  much  longer  period  than  it 
would  without  them. 


202  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

This  is  the  gist  of  the  wearing  of  glasses  for  long 
sight,  as  it  applies  to  the  child  or  the  youth.  Later 
in  life,  another  form  of  it  develops,  which  requires 
appropriate  correction.  That  is  the  well-known 
"failing  sight"  for  reading  or  writing  purposes,  of 
middle  and  elderly  life,  technically  known  as  pres- 
byopia, "elderly  sight."  This  painfully  familiar 
phenomenon  is  due  to  the  fact  that  while  the  crys- 
talline lens  is  growing  all  through  life,  after  the  man- 
ner described  in  discussing  cataract,  it  is  growing  in 
thickness  more  rapidly  at  the  circumference  than  at 
the  centre,  and  hence  is  becoming  flatter  and  of 
lower  refractive  power.  So  that  after  a  time  the 
eye  will  no  longer  bring  parallel  rays  to  a  focus  on 
the  retina.  What  is,  however,  more  effective  in 
producing  this  "old  sight"  is  that  as  it  grows  both 
larger  and  older,  it  loses  elasticity,  and  is  no  longer 
able  to  change  its  shape  so  as  to  "accommodate" 
the  eye  for  near  vision.  Here  again,  the  same  con- 
dition confronts  us  as  in  congenital  hypermetropia, 
and  we  simply  place  a  lens  in  front  of  the  eye,  whose 
bulge  corresponds  to  the  degree  of  flattening  of  the 
lens.  This  flattening  and  loss  of  elasticity  has 
usually  progressed  in  most  eyes  at  such  a  rate  that 
by  somewhere  about  the  fortieth  year,  or  shortly 
after,  it  becomes  necessary  to  correct  it  by  means  of 
a  lens.  As  it  is  however  progressing,  it  will  be 
necessary  to  supply  a  somewhat  stronger  lens  on  an 
average  of  about  every  five  years  until  after  the 


EYES  AND'  EARS  203 

sixty-fifth  year,  after  which  the  change  either 
ceases,  or  is  much  slower. 

Instead  of  the  eye  —  either  in  youth  or  in  old 
age  —  being  made  any  weaker  by  these  glasses,  it  is 
made  stronger  and  more  efficient,  and  younger  in 
every  way.  The  failing  sight  of  old  age  has  been 
almost  abolished  by  the  combined  aid  of  glasses  and 
the  operation  for  cataract,  and  there  is  no  necessity 
whatever  that  those  who  look  out  of  the  window 
should  be  darkened  as  long  as  life  lasts.  Glasses 
in  fact  have  done  more  to  reduce  the  pains  and 
penalties  of  old  age  and  to  prolong  the  comfort  and 
efficiency  of  life  than  any  other  single  mechanical 
factor  invented.  So  long  as  a  man  can  see  well, 
and  read  his  newspapers  and  his  favourite  books, 
there  is  no  reason  for  his  losing  interest  and  enjoy- 
ment in  life. 

When  we  add  the  good  digestion  that  comes 
from  properly  made  artificial  teeth,  and  the  abo- 
lition of  deafness  by  intelligent  care  of  the  nose  and 
throat,  it  is  not  too  much  to  say  that  civilization 
has  almost  abolished  the  more  serious  penalties  of 
old  age. 

Now,  as  to  the  opposite  defect  of  the  eye,  known  as 
short  sight,  or  myopia,  due  again  to  nature's  over- 
sight. This  is  due  to  the  eye  having  overgrown, 
so  to  speak,  so  that  it  is  too  large  and  bulges  too 
much,  just  as  the  long-sighted  or  hypermetropic  eye 
is  flattened  too  much.  It  has  been  proposed,  simply 


204  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

as  a  convenient  figure  of  speech,  to  call  one  of  these 
the  "onion-shaped"  or  flat  eye,  and  the  other  the 
"orange-shaped"  or  bulging  eye. 

Naturally,  this  produces  just  the  opposite  effect 
upon  the  light  rays,  viz.,  that  parallel  rays  of  light 
entering  the  eye  are  brought  to  a  focus  in  front  of 
the  retina  instead  of  behind  it,  as  in  long  sight. 
Equally  obviously,  as  every  effort  of  the  ciliary 
muscle  increases  the  bulge  of  the  eye,  muscular 
activity  can  do  nothing  to  cure  this  defect.  In 
fact,  it  simply  aggravates  it.  However,  just  as  soon 
as  objects  are  brought  within  five  of  six  feet  or  nearer 
so  that  the  rays  from  them  become  divergent,  then 
these  rays  are  brought  to  a  focus  upon  the  retina 
without  effort.  So  that  the  possessor  of  the  myopic 
eye  can  read  and  write  almost  perfectly,  and  with 
very  little  effort.  Objects  can  be  approached  to  the 
eye  until  they  even  touch  the  tip  of  the  nose  without 
becoming  blurred  in  their  outlines,  so  that  is  often 
the  impression  of  the  myope  that  he  has  an  un- 
usually strong  eye,  though  for  distant  vision,  he  is 
of  course,  as  his  name  implies,  short-sighted.  The 
cure  of  this  defect  is  as  simple  as  that  of  hyperopia, 
viz.,  to  put  a  concave,  or  — ,  lens  in  front  of  the  eye, 
which  will  neutralize  its  bulge,  and  will  cause  parallel 
rays  to  be  brought  to  a  focus  upon  the  retina. 
Obviously  these  glasses  must  be  worn  constantly, 
except  that  occasionally  they  may  be  removed  for 
near  work.  This  form  of  defect  of  the  eye  can  be 


EYES  AND  EARS  205 

made  worse  by  excessive  use  of  the  eyes  for  near 
work,  and  especially  in  bad  light,  or  under  un- 
favourable hygienic  surroundings.  While  fortu- 
nately less  than  a  third  as  common  as  long  sight,  it  is 
far  more  dangerous.  Both  because  it  increases  the 
risks  of  accident  and  because  when  eyes  are  over- 
strained in  poorly  lighted  rooms,  and  especially  in 
underfed  children  who  live  in  unsanitary  surround- 
ings, this  defect  increases  with  the  use  of  the  eye, 
and  with  the  growth  of  the  child.  In  the  higher 
grades  of  certain  German  schools,  for  instance,  it 
reaches  the  appalling  prevalence  of  thirty-five  per 
cent,  to  forty-five  per  cent,  of  the  class,  though  in  the 
lower  grades  it  is  not  more  than  fifteen  per  cent. 

There  is  still  another  type  of  defective  shape  of 
the  eye,  which  is  quite  common,  though  less  so  than 
either  long  sight  or  short  sight,  and  that  is 
astigmatism.  This  consists  in  a  complicated  con- 
dition or  shape  of  the  eye,  caused  by  its  bulging,  or 
being  flattened  —  as  the  case  may  be  —  more  in  the 
vertical  plane  than  in  the  horizontal,  thus  giving 
a  skew  shape  to  the  eye.  This,  though  less  blinding, 
is  an  exceedingly  annoying  and  irritating  defect, 
and  gives  rise  not  only  to  difficulty  and  trouble  in 
using  the  eyes,  but  also  to  many  disturbances  of  the 
nervous  system,  which  are  not  at  first  recognized 
as  due  to  eyestrain,  such  as  headache,  nervous 
dyspepsia  and  neuralgic  attacks.  It  can  also  be 
corrected  by  placing  glasses  of  a  peculiar  shape, 


206  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

known  as  "cylinders,"  before  the  eye.  Whatever 
the  form  of  the  defect,  it  is  of  the  utmost  importance 
that  this  should  be  recognized  and  properly  fitting 
glasses  adjusted  by  a  competent  oculist,  and  worn. 

All  progressive  departments  of  education  are 
now  insisting  upon  a  periodic  examination  of  the 
eyes  of  all  school  children,  and  the  correcting  of 
such  defects  as  may  be  found.  It  is  little  better 
than  a  waste  of  time  and  money  to  endeavour  to 
teach  children  who  are  suffering  from  unconnected 
long  sight,  short  sight,  or  astigmatism,  for  not  only 
are  they  unable  to  see  properly,  and  their  poor 
little  eyes  become  easily  fatigued  and  confused, 
but  they  are  liable  to  headache,  loss  of  appetite, 
restless  sleep,  and  a  whole  group  of  nervous  symp- 
toms which  will  persist  in  spite  of  all  sorts  of  treat- 
ment until  their  cause  is  discovered.  The  popular 
impression  that  glasses  in  some  way  weaken  the 
eye,  or  aggravate  the  defects  which  they  are  in- 
tended to  cure,  is  entirely  baseless,  unless  they  have 
been  fitted  by  incompetent  persons.  And  the  terri- 
ble penalty  thatyou  "become  dependent  upon  them," 
is  merely  an  expression  of  the  good  judgment  of  your 
eye,  when  once  it  has  been  given  full  and  perfect 
vision,  in  declining  to  be  satisfied  with  anything  else. 

One  touch  of  silver  lining  in  the  cloud  of  the 
myope  should  be  mentioned  and  that  is  that  this 
flattening  and  hardening  process  which  comes  on 
with  age  and  makes  the  long-sighted  individual 


EYES  AND  EARS  207 

more  long-sighted  has  the  fortunate  effect  of 
steadily  lessening  his  defect.  So  that  about  the 
time  that  his  long-sighted  comrades  begin  to  put 
their  glasses  on  for  age,  he  can  begin  to  weaken  his, 
and  ultimately  may  be  able  to  dispense  with  them 
altogether.  This  is  the  explanation  of  those  in- 
stances of  how  much  stronger  and  healthier  the 
eyes  were  a  generation  or  two  ago,  based  on  the 
statement  that  Grandfather  So-and-So  was  able  to 
read  his  Bible  without  specs  at  the  age  of  seventy- 
five.  The  good  man  had  probably  been  a  myope 
of  moderate  degree  all  his  life  without  discover- 
ing it,  and  owed  his  ability  to  do  without  spectacles 
in  old  age  merely  to  the  abnormal  shape  of  his  eye, 
and  not  to  the  preservation  of  his  youthful  vigour. 

Like  eyesight,  the  only  difference  between  the 
hearing  of  the  savage  and  of  the  civilized  man  lies 
in  the  extent  and  direction  in  which  they  have  been 
trained.  Deafness  is  quite  common  among  savages, 
though  less  so  than  in  civilized  races  for  the  grim 
reason  that  the  savage  who  cannot  hear  the  approach 
of  the  panther  or  the  tiger,  or  the  stealthy  footfall 
of  the  scalp-hunter  from  a  hostile  tribe,  is  not 
likely  to  attain  a  ripe  old  age.  There  is  nothing  in 
the  conditions  of  civilization  which  tends  to  throw 
any  more  severe  strain  upon  the  ear  or  hearing.  The 
popular  impression  that  the  din  and  clatter  and  jan- 
gle of  modern  city  life,  of  machinery,  of  locomotives, 
of  boiler  factories,  of  steam  whistles,  has  an  injurious 


208  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

effect  upon  the  nerves  of  hearing,  is  without  lounda- 
tion.  Such  effects  as  may  be  produced  by  these 
abominable  and  cacophonous  noises,  is  due  entirely 
to  their  secondary  effect  upon  the  nervous  system, 
particularly  through  causing  loss  of  sleep,  or  rest. 

As  in  the  case  of  vision,  the  real  enemy  of  hearing, 
the  principal  cause  of  acquired  deafness,  is  disease, 
and  particularly  the  infectious  diseases.  Complete  or 
absolute  deafness  is  usually  due  to  disease  or  defect 
of  the  auditory  nerve,  or  nerve  of  hearing.  The 
defect  is  usually  congenital  and  about  one  third  of 
deaf  mutes  are  born  deaf.  The  majority  of  them 
however  are  made  deaf  by  the  attack  on  the  audi- 
tory nerve  of  some  disease  in  infancy  or  early  child- 
hood, most  commonly  meningitis,  particularly  the 
cerebro-spinal,  or  epidemic  variety. 

Neither  of  these  distressing  conditions  is  fort- 
unately very  common,  not  more  than  one  or  two 
children  in  a  thousand  being  affected.  It  is  perhaps 
hardly  necessary  to  say  in  passing  that  children  who 
are  born  deaf,  or  become  so  within  the  first  four  or 
five  years  of  life,  are  usually  dumb.  Their  loss  of 
speech  has  usually  nothing  whatever  to  do  with  the 
vocal  organs,  which  are  usually  in  perfect  condition; 
but,  being  entirely  unable  to  hear  the  sounds  which 
they  themselves  make,  they  cannot  control  them  so 
as  to  form  articulate  speech,  nor  can  they  hear  and 
imitate  the  sounds  made  by  others.  They  can, 
however,  scream  or  cry  out,  groan,  etc.,  often  very 


EYES  AND  EARS  209 

loudly,  but  with  absolutely  no  meaning  or  inflection 
in  the  sounds.  By  an  ingenious  system  of  instruc- 
tion, substituting  the  position  of  the  lips  and  the 
sensation  of  the  muscles  of  the  throat  for  the  sense  of 
hearing,  they  can  be  taught  to  speak  quite  clearly 
and  fairly,  though  in  a  mechanical,  colourless,  pho- 
nographic voice. 

Nine  tenths,  however,  of  the  defects  of  hearing, 
are  partial,  and  these  are  almost  invariably  due  to 
inflammations  beginning  in  and  extending  from  the 
throat  up  through  the  eustachian  tubes  to  the  drum- 
cavity  and  do  not  originate  in  the  ears  at  all.  Scarlet 
fever  is  the  most  frequent  factor,  and  will  some- 
times almost  completely  destroy  the  hearing.  Diph- 
theria also  may  produce  deafness  in  this  way,  as 
also  may  tuberculosis.  But  the  commonest  cause 
of  deafness  is  ordinary  catarrhal  inflammation  of 
the  nose  and  throat,  neglected  until  it  extends  to 
or  blocks  up  the  eustachian  tubes.  In  the  earlier 
years  of  life,  this  inflammation  is  set  up  most  fre- 
quently by  adenoids,  in  later  life,  by  a  variety  of 
chronic  catarrhal  processes.  Take  care  of  the  throat, 
and  the  ears  will  take  care  of  themselves  in  ninety- 
five  cases  out  of  a  hundred.  The  only  way  to  cure 
disease  of  the  ear  is  to  treat  it  while  it  is  still  in  the 
throat. 


CHAPTER  XI 

THE    WORSHIP    OF    THE    RACE    STREAM 

MAN  has  tried  his  hand  at  worshipping 
almost  everything  in  the  universe  that 
he  can  think  of  —  including  himself.  His 
worship  was  a  desperate  attempt  to  anchor  himself 
to  something  that  would  endure,  to  range  himself 
in  the  scheme  of  things.  He  has  worshipped 
the  wind  and  the  lightning,  the  sun,  moon,  and 
stars,  the  earth  and  the  sea,  his  ancestors  and 
the  phantoms  of  his  dreams:  always  something 
behind  him,  ever  something  in  the  past. 

The  time  has  come  for  a  worship  of  the  future. 
Why  not  worship  our  posterity  instead  of  our 
ancestry,  our  children  instead  of  our  grandparents. 
Such  a  religion  would  have  the  marked  practical 
advantage  of  doing  good  to  the  object  worshipped, 
as  well  as  to  ourselves.  As  the  main  object  of 
religion  has  ever  been  to  ingratiate  ourselves  with 
the  Powers  That  Be,  here  is  a  chance  to  consolidate 
ourselves  with  the  powers  that  are  to  come,  in- 
stead of  with  the  "Have  Beens." 

To  worship  our  children  would  give  the  best  pos- 
sible guarantee  that  they  will  worship  our  memory, 


WORSHIP  OF  THE  RACE  STREAM      211 

which  is  what  we  desire  above  all  things.  Our 
deepest  dread  is  of  being  forgotten;  that  is  the  only 
perdition  which  we  fear.  In  the  race  we  have 
been  alive  since  the  beginning  of  time,  and  in  the 
race  and  its  memories  of  us,  we  shall  endure  until 
all  eternity.  If  we  long  for  immortality,  here 
it  is.  If  we  yearn  for  something  enduring,  ever 
conquering,  something  by  the  side  of  whose  an- 
tiquity the  pyramids  and  the  Sphinx  are  but  as 
mushrooms,  behold  it! 

We  used  to  regard  life  as  something  fleeting, 
perishable,  to  be  destroyed  by  a  breath,  evanescent 
as  a  melting  snowflake.  Now  we  know  it  to  be 
a  thing  almost  infinitely  hard,  enduring,  resistant 
to  every  change,  and  to  every  onslaught,  forcing 
its  way  over  every  sort  of  opposition,  adapting 
itself  to  every  shift  of  circumstance  and  change 
of  scenes,  but  remaining  itself  unchanged. 

No  snow-capped  mountain  chain,  no  sculptured 
obelisk,  no  shape  of  a  continent  has  changed  as 
little  as  man  has  in  the  last  fifty  thousand  years. 
The  individual  dies,  but  the  race  remains,  un- 
changed, save  by  improvement  and,  barring  some 
cosmic  catastrophe  will  continue  so  to  survive 
indefinitely. 

And  fear  not  lest  Existence  closing  your 
Account  and  Mine  shall  know  the  like  no  more 
The  Eternal  Saki  from  that  bowl  has  poured 
Millions  of  bubbles  like  us,  and  shall  pour. 


2i2  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

The  race  has  made  us  what  we  are.  In  the  race 
is  all  our  hope  of  the  future.  What  can  be  a  higher 
and  more  sacred  duty  than  to  preserve  the  purity 
of  its  stream,  and  hand  on  its  inheritance  un- 
diminished,  its  torch  of  life  undimmed,  to  the 
next  generation.  Of  some  such  character  will  be 
the  religion  of  the  future. 

The  study  of  the  continuance  of  the  race,  its 
mechanisms  and  the  dangers  and  perils  to  which 
it  is  exposed  is  as  fascinating  as  it  is  vital  and 
important.  We  can  best,  and  indeed  only,  study 
ourselves  in  our  ancestry,  and  the  most  important 
use  we  can  make  of  this  knowledge  is  to  benefit  our 
offspring.  It  is  a  good  thing  to  "Know  Thyself," 
but  much  better  to  know  thy  children,  for  they  are 
young  and  plastic,  and  not  past  mending.  It  is  often 
difficult  to  get  properly  acquainted  with  yourself  until 
it  is  too  late  for  the  knowledge  to  do  you  much  good. 
We  cannot  exercise  much  choice  in  the  selection  of 
our  parents,  but  we  can  in  those  of  our  children. 

The  methods  by  which  the  torch  of  life  is  handed 
down  from  one  generation  to  the  next  are  of  a 
singular  simplicity  and  beauty,  although  in  some 
of  their  more  elaborate  forms  at  first  sight,  ap- 
parently complex.  The  fundamental  process  is 
exactly  the  same  in  all  the  myriad  forms  of  life, 
from  the  ameba  to  man,  namely,  the  division  of 
one  cell  into  two  halves.  In  the  simplest  forms 
the  one-roomed  house  of  life,  where  the  body  con- 


WORSHIP  OF  THE  RACE  STREAM       213 

sists  of  but  a  single  cell,  the  organism  never  dies, 
but  simply  grows  as  big  as  it  can,  and  then  cuts 
itself  in  two,  making  two  cells,  where  but  one  was 
before.  The  creature  divides  itself  into  two  equal 
parts,  both  of  which  "live  happy  ever  after."  It  is 
in  fact  immortal. 

Only  when  the  body  has  reached  the  complexity  of 
a  colony  of  cells  with  division  of  labour  among  them, 
does  death  appear  on  the  scene.  Then  a  single  cell, 
or  small  group  of  cells,  is  budded  off  from  the  side  of 
the  old  and  decaying  body  to  start  a  new  life  of  its 
own.  Thus  as  has  been  picturesquely  expressed, 
"Death  is  the  price  paid  for  a  body."  By  either  of 
these  methods,  splitting  or  budding  a  single  animal, 
consisting  of  a  cell  or  small  group  of  cells,  can  go  on 
reproducing  itself  indefinitely;  but  by  the  time  the 
process  has  reached  fifty  or  a  hundred  generations, 
its  energy  begins  to  slacken,  and  its  power  of  drink- 
ing in  the  life-giving  sun-current  from  its  surround- 
ings begins  to  wane.  It  gets  stale  and  jaded  and 
feeble,  and  unless  new  life  can  be  added  from 
some  source,  it  will  die  out  and  disappear.  If, 
however,  one  of  these  cells  should  happen  to  meet  a 
foreign,  or  unrelated  cell,  and  by  a  curious  reversal 
of  the  multiplication  process  the  two  unite  and  fuse 
together  to  become  one  cell,  then  the  process  of 
reproduction  starts  up  again  with  primitive  vigour, 
and  continues  luxuriantly  for  another  one  hundred 
generations. 


214  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

This  is  the  birth  of  sex,  and  the  higher  and  the 
more  complicated  the  organism  becomes  the  greater 
and  more  absolutely  vital  becomes  the  necessity 
of  conjugation,  or  the  combining  of  one  cell  with 
another  in  order  to  produce  a  third. 

The  next  step  is  the  budding  off  of  a  few  germ 
cells  on  purpose  to  form  a  new  organism  and  these 
are  of  two  sorts:  cells  of  the  male  type,  and  cells 
of  the  female  type.  Both  of  these  are  at  first 
produced  by  the  same  organism,  and  each  is  in- 
capable of  reproducing  on  its  own  account,  but  must 
combine  with  its  counterpart  of  the  opposite  sex 
in  order  to  become  fertile.  In  spite  of  this  di- 
vision of  labour  however,  the  female  cell  still  re- 
tains traces  of  its  pristine  power  of  unaided  repro- 
duction on  its  own  account.  This  was  brilliantly 
shown  a  few  years  ago  in  the  experiments  of  Loeb, 
who,  by  adjusting  the  temperature  and  salt  percen- 
tage of  sea  water,  succeeded  in  making  the  un- 
fertilized eggs  of  both  the  sea-urchin  and  star-fish 
begin  to  develop  into  larvae,  and  reach  the  first 
stage  of  reproductive  growth. 

In  the  earliest  forms  of  race-continuing  experi- 
ments, when  she  was  "trying  her  'prentice  hand," 
as  it  were,  Nature  simply  did  the  easiest  thing 
first  and  arranged  for  the  production  of  both  male 
and  female  germ  cells  by  the  same  individual, 
so  that  originally  all  animals  were  bi-sexual.  This 
may  seem  like  a  very  far  cry  from  the  twentieth 


WORSHIP  OF  THE  RACE  STREAM       215 

century,  but  so  long  and  obstinately  did  Nature 
muddle  along  with  this  clumsy  method  of  rejuve- 
nating the  race  stream  at  each  generation,  that  it 
became  stamped  deeply  into  the  very  fibre  of  our 
beings,  and  even  to-day  the  most  highly  specialized 
animals  carry  in  their  bodies  the  germs  and  partially 
developed  rudiments  of  all  the  structures  belonging 
to  both  sexes.  If  one  set  of  these  rudiments  de- 
velops to  full  completion,  the  individual  becomes 
of  one  sex;  if  those  of  the  other  sex  so  develop,  of 
the  opposite.  But  so  alive  and  full  of  possibilities 
are  both  these  sets  of  rudiments  that  if  by  any  chance 
or  accident  the  germ  glands  of  an  individual  become 
impaired  or  diseased,  then  both  sets  of  rudiments 
begin  to  develop  together,  producing  often  strange 
and  fantastic  hybrids  between  the  two  genders. 
Some  of  these  unused  rudiments  —  which  of  course 
have  nothing  to  do  and  like  all  idle  members  of  the 
community  are  apt  to  get  into  mischief  —  play 
quite  an  important  role  in  pathology  and  become 
the  site  of  troublesome  and  even  serious  disturbances. 
But,  after  a  few  million  years  of  experience  with 
this  method  of  reviving  the  race  stream,  it  was 
found,  by  some  lucky  accident,  that  if  the  germ  cell 
produced  by  one  individual  happened  to  combine 
with  a  germ  cell  produced  by  another  individual, 
instead  of  with  one  of  its  brothers  or  sisters,  the 
result  was  a  much  more  vigorous  and  enterprising 
new  generation. 


2i6  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

Animals  born  of  such  "foreign"  unions,  inheriting 
the  best  of  both  parental  streams  and  stimulated 
to  new  life  by  the  admixture  of  different  strains 
were  so  much  sturdier  and  more  enterprising 
than  the  offspring  of  the  old  "marriage  within 
the  family"  matings,  that  they  gradually  exter- 
minated them  upon  their  own  levels,  or  climbed 
above  them  to  higher  ones.  So  that  for  many 
millions  of  years  past  only  those  unambitious  and 
indolent  creatures  which  were  content  to  remain 
at  the  bottom,  or  on  the  two  or  three  lower  steps 
of  the  Jacob's  ladder  of  animal  life,  such  as  the 
sea  anemones,  the  starfish,  the  molluscs,  shell- 
fish and  the  worms,  have  retained  the  old  clumsy 
and  primitive  method  of  producing  germ  cells  of 
both  sexes  in  the  same  individual.  And  even  the 
most  enterprising  and  progressive  class  of  these, 
the  worms,  the  only  ones  who  really  "get  anywhere, " 
in  the  sense  of  becoming  the  ancestors  of  higher 
forms  of  life,  including  ourselves  —  for  we  are 
literally  "worms  of  the  dust"  in  an  even  deeper 
and  more  fundamental  sense  than  that  intended 
by  the  Psalmist  —  although  they  still  keep  up 
the  production  of  both  kinds  of  germ  cells,  take  care 
that  the  gonads  produced  by  one  individual  are 
quickened,  not  by  their  brother  or  sister  cells,  but 
by  the  gonads  of  another  individual. 

This  interesting  intermediate  state  of  affairs  is  most 
familiar  to  us  and  was  first  discovered  in  flowering 


WORSHIP  OF  THE  RACE  STREAM       217 

plants,  most  of  which  possess,  as  is  well  known, 
both  male  gonads,  or  anthers  with  their  pollen, 
and  female  gonads  or  pistils  with  their  ovules,  but 
which  take,  so  to  speak,  the  greatest  pains  by 
means  of  brilliantly  coloured  blossoms,  powerful 
perfumes,  honey  and  other  sweets,  to  ensure  the 
fertilization  of  their  pistils  by  pollen  from  some  other 
flower,  carried  upon  the  wings  and  legs  of  some 
honey-loving  insect. 

Flowers  are  splendid  advertisers  and  literally 
"spread  themselves"  to  attract  their  insect-cus- 
tomers: they  are  in  fact  the  earliest  prototypes 
of  the  much  maligned  yellow  journalism,  red  type, 
pink  paper,  huge  headlines  and  all,  for  they  flaunt 
their  notices  of  bargain  sales,  "positively  for  this 
day  only,"  in  all  the  colours  of  the  rainbow  —  crim- 
son and  silver  and  purple  and  blue  and  gold.  If,  to 
blow  one's  own  horn,  in  all  the  loudest  tones  of  the 
"chromatic"  scale  be  immodest,  then  flowers 
"in  the  days  of  innocence"  were  the  first  offenders, 
not  man  "in  the  days  of  villainy,"  as  Falstaff 
pathetically  pleads.  As  they  have  no  circulation, 
in  fact  are  billboard  posters  and  wallpapers 
rather  than  newspapers,  and  their  life  is  of  the 
shortest,  they  are  obliged  to  exert  to  the  utmost 
every  art  of  display  and  of  attraction;  and  to  this  we 
owe  that  superb  and  gorgeous  pageantry  of  glowing 
colour,  of  exquisite  form,  of  delicious  perfume  which 
fills  the  meadows  and  woodlands  every  spring. 


2i8  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

It  is  an  interesting  illustration  of  the  essential 
and  inherent  beauty  and  charm  and  purity  of  sex 
that  to  it  and  its  influences  alone  we  owe  all  the 
beauty  of  flowers,  the  vivid  and  brilliant  plumage 
of  birds,  the  rapturous  melody  of  their  songs, 
the  velvety  splendour  of  the  coats  of  animals,  the 
beauty  of  their  forms,  the  poetry  of  their  motion 
and  the  majesty  of  their  bearing.  The  painted 
splendours  of  the  butterfly's  wing,  the  meteor- 
glow  of  the  firefly,  the  exquisite  beauty  and  deli- 
cate charm  of  woman  spring  from  the  same  source. 
In  fact  little  that  we  know  and  delight  in  of  colour 
and  outline,  of  musical  tone,  the  whole  arts  of 
painting,  of  sculpture,  of  music,  of  architecture,  of 
dress  and  the  drama,  and  the  best  part  of  religion 
would  ever  have  come  into  existence  without  it. 
A  fair  half  of  all  that  makes  life  delightful  and 
ennobling  and  wholesome  springs  from  this  noble 
source. 

If  any  instinct  that  stirs  the  breast  of  man  can 
claim  to  be  elevating  and  holy,  it  is  the  one  which 
concerns  itself  with  the  life  and  the  continuance 
of  the  race.  It  is  the  first  impulse  which  lifts  man 
outside  of  himself,  the  very  basis  of  all  altruism  and 
devotion  and  the  mother  of  all  the  gentler  virtues, 
love,  affection  and  kindliness.  Yet  the  ascetics 
of  all  ages,  being  themselves  ugly  and  cowardly 
and  filthy,  have  hated  the  race-instinct  because 
it  was  beautiful  and  brave  and  clean.  As  they 


WORSHIP  OF  THE  RACE  STREAM       219 

were  unfortunately  our  first  teachers  and  writers 
they  have  so  persistently  vilified  this  noble  impulse 
that  they  have  succeeded  in  persuading  us  into 
regarding  it  as  one  of  the  lowest  and  most  disgrace- 
ful and  bestial  in  our  nature.  The  mere  mention  or 
discussion  of  its  processes  and  mechanisms  is  re- 
garded as  immodest  and  indecent,  and  their  very 
existence  is  officially  ignored. 

An  imitation  virtue  called  modesty  has  been 
called  into  existence  for  this  very  purpose,  and 
as  the  bird  of  Minerva,  the  goddess  of  wisdom,  is 
the  owl,  so  the  bird  of  modesty,  the  goddess  of 
prudery,  is  the  ostrich,  with  its  head  in  the  sand. 
We  have  allowed  the  mere  facts  that  this  impulse 
is  possessed  by  the  animals,  that  it  is  at  times 
of  overmastering  power,  and  that  like  any  other 
natural  impulse  it  may  be  followed  to  injurious 
extremes,  to  blind  us  to  the  fact  that  it  is  the  basis 
and  beginning  of  not  merely  conjugal  but  also 
maternal  and  filial  affection,  in  fact,  of  the  family 
and  all  the  softening  and  ennobling  influences  that 
cluster  around  it;  and  upon  the  family  is  built 
the  state,  the  nation,  and  the  world  of  civilization 
and  progress. 

Instead  of  being,  as  we  have  been  falsely  taught, 
one  of  the  most  blindly  selfish  and  ruthless  of  im- 
pulses, it  is  only  the  natural  and  instinctive  im- 
pulse of  man,  whose  aim  is  the  existence  and  welfare 
of  others  than  himself.  The  mere  fact  that  it  is 


220  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

of  animal  origin  counts  to-day  in  its  favour  instead 
of  against  it,  for  the  study  of  origins  has  given  our 
pride  a  sad  but  well-deserved  fall  by  showing  us 
that  three  fourths  of  our  virtues  have  been  inherited 
from  the  animals,  while  an  equal  share  of  our 
vices  have  been  invented  by  ourselves.  The  dove 
on  her  nest,  the  dog  on  the  grave  of  his  master, 
and  the  tigress  daring  all  odds  in  defence  of  her 
cubs,  are  as  pure  and  touching  pictures  of  love, 
of  devotion  and  faithfulness  unto  death  as  those 
of  any  haloed  saint  or  legendary  martyr,  and  far 
more  beautiful  to  look  upon  and  more  wholesome 
to  imitate. 

The  haphazard,  unspecialized,  jack-of-all-trades 
condition  of  affairs  of  letting  the  same  organism 
produce  both  male  and  female  cells  and  leaving 
the  offspring  to  shift  for  themselves  was  soon  to 
be  abandoned  for  better  and  more  workmanlike 
methods.  The  first  great  step  in  advance  was  the 
production,  not  merely  of  two  kinds  of  germ  cells 
but  of  two  different  kinds  of  individual,  each  of 
which  was  to  produce  one  kind  of  cell.  This  had 
the  great  and  obvious  advantage  of  first  insuring 
a  mixture  of  the  strains,  and  second  of  allowing 
each  type  of  germ  cell  to  become  specialized  and 
thus  better  fitted  for  carrying  out  the  part  it  has 
to  play.  A  curious  difference  in  size  begins  to 
manifest  itself  at  once,  ova,  or  female  cells,  ap- 
parently robbing  the  male  cells  of  their  share  of 


WORSHIP  OF  THE  RACE  STREAM       221 

nutrition  and  becoming  from  ten  to  twenty  times 
larger  than  their  partners,  while  the  latter  shrank 
in  like  proportion.  This  is  where  the  subjection 
and  comparative  insignificance  of  man  began  —  and 
has  continued  ever  since. 

At  first  the  individuals  who  produced  the  two 
different  types  of  cells  remained  exactly  similar 
in  size  and  appearance,  as  they  do  to  this  day, 
for  instance,  in  the  vast  majority  of  fishes,  snakes, 
tortoises,  alligators  and  other  reptiles.  But  it 
was  not  long  before  advantage  began  to  be  taken 
of  this  division  of  labour  to  specialize  and  advance 
still  further,  and  the  organisms  which  produced 
the  female  germ  cells,  or  ova  (eggs)  began  to  assume 
certain  characters  which  fitted  them  better  for  the 
part  which  they  had  to  play,  in  fact  became  female; 
while  those  which  produced  the  male  cells,  on  the 
other  hand,  assumed  other  distinctive  characters 
which  marked  them  as  males. 

The  differences  between  the  two  sexes  for  a  long 
time,  however,  remained  comparatively  slight.  It 
is  impossible  for  the  untrained  eye  to  distinguish 
between  the  male  and  female  of  most  fishes,  and 
even  an  expert  will  often  have  much  difficulty  in 
deciding  without  making  a  dissection.  As  a  rule 
the  female  is  slightly  the  larger  and  somewhat 
the  duller-coloured  of  the  two,  and  apt  to  be  more 
sluggish  in  her  movements  and  more  retiring  in 
her  habits,  so  as  to  avoid  the  attack  of  natural 


222  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

enemies.  The  male,  on  the  other  hand,  though 
smaller  and  brighter-coloured,  begins  to  display 
the  true  masculine  qualities  of  aggressiveness, 
pugnacity  and  vanity.  But  all  things  taken  to- 
gether, the  sexes  are  far  more  equal  at  this  time 
than  they  have  been  since,  or  ever  will  be  again 
—  until  the  suffragettes  win  their  fight. 

This  monotonous  and  uninteresting  state  of  affairs 
exists  until  another  factor  comes  into  play,  and  that 
is  the  first  beginnings  of  care  for  the  young.  Hith- 
erto, with  a  few  rare  exceptions,  the  young,  whether 
split,  bud,  sexless  new  cell,  or  fertilized  ovum,  have 
been  simply  turned  adrift  in  the  water  or  upon 
the  earth  to  shift  for  themselves.  In  the  simplest 
and  most  primitive  form  of  reproduction,  of  course, 
the  cutting  themselves  in  two  of  the  one-celled 
organisms,  like  the  ameba,  the  white  corpuscles 
of  our  blood,  the  parasite  of  malaria,  etc.,  there 
can  be  no  question  of  parental  care.  Indeed  it 
would  have  taken  all  the  casuistry  of  the  school- 
men to  decide  which  of  the  two  new  cells  was 
mother  and  which  was  daughter,  and  the  question 
of  seniority  between  them  would  ever  remain 
as  insoluble  as  that  of  the  age  of  Ann.  In  fact 
here  is  where  the  eternal  uncertainty  as  to  the 
precise  age  of  woman  began  —  it  would  all  de- 
pend upon  which  was  separated  first,  when  the 
maternal  cell  cut  itself  in  two. 

The  animals  which  bud  off  their  young  from  their 


WORSHIP  OF  THE  RACE  STREAM       223 

sides  are  naturally  as  indifferent  to  their  future 
welfare  and  as  incapable  of  furthering  it  as  the 
plants  which  they  so  closely  resemble.  So  that 
it  is  not  until  the  sexes  become  entirely  separate 
and  are  so  well  able  to  take  care  of  themselves  as 
to  have  some  energy  and  skill  to  spare  for  their 
young  that  the  beginnings  of  parental  care  first 
appear.  It  is  true  that  certain  worms  lay  their 
eggs  in  packages  or  capsules  and  appear  to  take 
a  kind  of  vague  interest  in  them  until  they  are 
hatched;  and  some  of  the  crustaceans,  such  as  the 
lobster  and  crayfish,  attach  their  eggs  by  a  tena- 
cious gummy  substance  to  the  concave  under-sur- 
face  of  their  powerful  swimming-tails,  where  they 
remain  until  the  young  are  hatched.  But  with 
these  exceptions  it  is  not  until  we  come  rather  high 
up  among  the  fishes,  in  the  salmon  and  the  sunfish 
tribes  for  instance,  that  definite,  purposeful  parental 
care  begins  to  show  itself. 

Oddly  enough  it  first  shows  itself  most  actively 
and  definitely  in  the  male,  so  that  the  proud  and 
haughty  claim  so  often  put  forward  by  the  superior 
sex  that  motherhood  is  an  older  and  far  higher 
function  than  fatherhood  is  not  as  well  founded 
as  might  be  desired.  The  mother  does  not  even 
build  the  first  nest,  for  this  office  is  undertaken 
for  practically  the  first  time  in  the  animal  king- 
dom by  the  male  salmon,  who,  in  that  singular 
spawning  pilgrimage  up  from  the  deep  sea  —  the 


224  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

oldest  and  most  sacred  pilgrimage  on  record  — 
swims  two  or  three  days  ahead  of  the  female  up 
the  rivers  and  streams  until  a  suitable  spawning 
ground  is  reached.  As  soon  as  this  is  reached  he 
picks  out  a  clean,  gravelly  bar  at  the  foot  of  a 
rapid,  and  energetically  scoops  out  with  his  snout 
a  basin-like  nest  or  spawning  bed,  carefully  re- 
moving all  the  larger  stones  and  coarser  gravel 
so  that  a  smooth,  even  bed  of  fine  gravel  remains. 
This  he  vigorously  defends  against  all  other  males, 
if  he  be  big  and  strong  enough,  until  the  arrival 
of  the  females,  when  he  proceeds  to  fight  for  and 
"cut  out  of  the  bunch"  the  lady  of  his  choice,  who 
thereupon  deposits  the  precious  layer  of  eggs  upon 
the  smooth,  gravelly  surface  he  has  provided. 

When  she  has  done  this  she  becomes  a  fine  lady 
at  once  and  takes  no  further  care  of  her  offspring, 
but  the  anxious  and  devoted  father,  after  carefully 
fertilizing  the  eggs,  stands,  or  swims,  guard  over 
them  day  and  night,  fighting  away  any  other 
salmon  who  would  invade  his  domain,  and  especially 
their  greatest  enemy  the  speckled  brook  trout, 
whose  favourite  and  most  appetizing  dish  is  an 
omelette  of  salmon's  eggs  au  nature!.  For  which 
greediness,  by  the  way,  he  is  punished  with  most 
poetic  justice,  as  the  higher  fishman  baits  his 
trout-hooks  with  these  tempting  morsels,  with 
most  killing  effect. 

The  same  domestic  virtues  are  displayed  by  the 


WORSHIP  OF  THE  RACE  STREAM       225 

common  sunfish,  or  "pumpkin-seed,"  of  our  ponds 
and  rivers.  So  plucky  is  he  that  he  will  sometimes 
even  attack  your  hand,  or  the  tip  of  your  fishing 
rod  if  it  approaches  his  treasure  too  closely,  and  a 
pretty  sight  he  makes  with  his  spines  erect  and  all 
his  colours  flashing  in  the  sun  as  he  dashes  hither 
and  thither  to  repel  all  invaders.  So,  while  it  may 
be  true  that  no  man  can  make  a  home,  it  is  not 
true  that  no  male  can.  Upon  primitive  biological 
grounds  it  would  appear  that  man  ought  to  be  the 
head  of  the  house,  but  of  course  "nous  avons  change 
tout  cela"  long  ago.  The  giddy,  pleasure-loving 
mamma  and  the  hard-working,  domestic  "poor  papa" 
are  exceedingly  venerable  institutions  biologically 

When  once  this  division  of  labour  in  the  care 
of  the  young  has  been  fairly  established,  the  two 
sexes  become  rapidly  and  markedly  different. 
Though  they  remain  for  the  most  part  nearly  equal 
in  size  and  weight,  the  male  becomes  the  stronger 
and  more  aggressive  of  the  two  and  usually  better 
provided  with  weapons  of  attack  and  defence, 
such  as  teeth,  horns,  etc.,  to  fit  him  for  the  duty 
of  defending  the  female  and  young  from  attack 
and  of  capturing  and  bringing  home  food.  The 
female,  on  the  other  hand,  becomes  more  vege- 
tative and  receptive  in  her  temperament,  quieter 
in  her  colouring  and  her  habits,  so  as  to  escape 
notice  and  attack  when  brooding  upon  the  nest 
or  caring  for  the  young.  The  sexes  now  become 


226  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

for  the  first  time  easily  distinguishable  even  to 
the  causal  eye,  and  the  stage  is  illustrated  in 
the  great  majority  of  birds,  a  few  of  the  higher 
reptiles,  and  a  considerable  part  of  the  insects. 
Eggs  are  still  deposited  and  fertilized  outside  of 
the  body  and  hatched  by  the  heat  of  the  sun,  the 
water  or  the  earth. 

In  one  rather  striking  particular  the  difference 
between  the  sexes  is  just  the  opposite  of  what  we 
would,  upon  modern  grounds,  have  expected; 
and  that  is  that  practically  all  the  decorations 
characteristic  of  sex  —  the  secondary  sexual  char- 
acters as  they  are  termed  —  are  possessed  by  the 
male.  And  this  singular  and  most  unjust  dis- 
crimination on  nature's  part  is  maintained  not 
only  through  the  whole  of  this  stage,  but  up 
though  to  the  highest  of  them  all,  until  finally,  at 
the  human  level,  women  win  the  rights  which  they 
now  imagine  have  been  theirs  since  the  begin- 
ning. To  the  male  alone  belong  the  splendid 
plumage,  the  glowing  colours,  the  piercing  melody 
of  song  among  birds  —  the  nightingale,  that  floods 
the  moonlit  glades  with  her  song,  by  the  way,  is 
not  a  "she"  but  a  "he";  and  it  is  the  male  that 
wears  the  magnificent  horns  and  antlers,  the  splen- 
did crests  and  manes,  the  most  glistening  satin  and 
velvet  of  coats  and  furs,  the  whitest  ivory  tusks, 
and  gains  the  highest  triumphs  of  both  speed  and 
strength  among  animals.  Man  is  fundamentally 


WORSHIP  OF  THE  RACE  STREAM       227 

and  really  the  ornamental  sex  and  always  retained 
his  rights  up  to  the  very  beginning  of  civilization, 
when  they  began  gradually  to  be  wrested  from 
him  by  the  other  sex,  which  has  now  acquired  a 
complete  monopoly  of  them.  If  it  comes  to  a 
question  of  lost  rights  and  liberties  it  is  man  who 
should  agitate  for  emancipation  rather  than  woman. 
Woman,  not  content  with  usurping  all  of  man's 
ancient  rights,  now  demands  his  modern  ones  as 
well,  and  she'll  get  them  too:  she  always  ".arrives," 
as  the  French  say. 

Here  we  reach  the  summit  and  perfection  of  the 
mechanisms  of  race  continuance  so  far  as  the 
parents  are  concerned  —  a  father  who  rights  and 
forages  and  a  mother  who  feeds  and  protects. 
In  fact  nowhere  is  there  to  be  found  a  more  beau- 
tiful picture  of  parental  devotion  and  family  life 
than  in  the  famous  and  now  pillar-of-the-church 
"birds  in  their  little  nests."  In  passing  it  might 
be  remarked,  as  a  matter  of  cold  biological  fact, 
they  do  not  "agree"  at  all,  but  squabble  furiously 
and  shamelessly  for  the  next  turn  at  the  dish  of 
worm  or  caterpillar  which  is  being  passed  round, 
and  shoulder  one  another  out  of  the  nest  with  the 
most  majority-stockholder  heartlessness  as  soon 
as  they  are  strong  enough.  The  young  cuckoo  in 
the  nest  is  not  the  moral  monster  that  he  is  made 
out  to  be.  Any  other  fledgling  that  could  get 
as  far  ahead  of  his  brothers  in  size  and  strength 


228  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

would  do  the  same.  Birdlings,  like  certain  nest- 
lings of  higher  degree,  are  little  more  than  hunger 
incarnate,  and  know  no  other  law. 

Both  father  and  mother  bird  take  part  in  the 
nest  building,  in  which,  however,  the  male  is  only 
a  hod-carrier,  roundly  bullied  and  "bossed  about" 
by  the  directing  female,  "just  like  folks,"  as  Eugene 
Wood  says. 

Both  the  parents  take  an  active  part  in  the  incu- 
bation of  the  eggs  and  divide  the  really  appalling 
labour  of  "rustling"  food  for  the  young. 

But  here  they  stop  and  a  much  less  picturesque 
and  attractive  group  of  living  creatures  take  up 
the  thread  of  race  continuance  and  carry  it  on 
to  its  highest  perfection  —  the  mammals,  or  "ani- 
mals" proper.  They  take  up  the  process  where 
the  birds  left  it,  so  to  speak,  and  proceed  to  develop 
it  along  a  side  line  which  had  hitherto  been  almost 
neglected,  and  that  is  the  careful  and  loving  special- 
ization and  perfection  of  the  place  where  the  young 
are  to  be  incubated  or  hatched.  Traces  of  this 
preparation  begin,  of  course,  at  a  very  early  age 
in  the  history  of  life;  in  fact,  it  is,  as  in  all  other 
stages  of  the  process,  the  logical  development 
of  a  beautifully  simple  and  rational  idea.  Some 
fishes,  as  we  have  seen,  prepare  nests  in  the  bed 
of  the  stream  and  watch  over  the  eggs  while  hatch- 
ing. Snakes  seek  out  a  hollow  in  the  ground, 
preferably  upon  some  sunny  bank,  where  their 


WORSHIP  OF  THE  RACE  STREAM       229 

eggs  can  be  hatched  by  the  heat  of  the  sun.  Turtles 
come  up  on  the  tropical  seashore  and  scoop  great 
holes  in  the  warm  sand  in  which  to  deposit  their 
bushel  of  eggs.  Birds  of  course  have  their  nests  in 
which  the  young,  no  longer  left  to  the  casual  rays 
of  the  sun,  are  hatched  by  the  brooding  warmth  of 
the  mother's  body. 

But  it  was  millions  and  millions  of  years  before 
the  simple  and  beautifully  sensible  idea  appears 
to  have  presented  itself  to  any  creature  that  the 
safest,  the  most  appropriate  and  logical  nest  for 
the  hatching  of  the  eggs  was  where  they  were 
originally  budded  off,  within  the  body  of  the  mother. 
Finally,  some  Miles  Standish-like  mother-creature 
adopted  the  motto,  "If  you  want  a  thing  done  well, 
do  it  yourself,"  and  concluded  that  hatching, 
unlike  charity,  should  not  only  begin  but  end  at 
home.  This  of  course  necessitated  the  fertiliza- 
tion of  the  eggs  without  their  leaving  the  body 
of  the  mother,  but  when  this  problem  was  once 
solved  a  perfectly  superb  power  of  extension  was 
given  to  parental  care  and  consequent  perfection 
of  development  of  the  young. 

How  enormously  valuable  and  far-reaching  this 
new  idea  was  may  be  seen  by  the  fact  that  even 
to  this  day  the  rank  of  an  animal  in  the  scale 
of  organized  life  runs  curiously  parallel  to  the 
length  of  time  which  it  has  been  incubated  in  the 
body  of  the  mother.  The  perfection  of  any  animal, 


230  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

including  man,  depends  largely  on  the  length  of 
time  that  has  been  spent  in  hatching  him.  If  he 
comes  out  of  the  maternal  incubator  one  tenth 
hatched,  as  it  were,  he  is  a  fish;  if  half  hatched, 
a  bird  or  reptile;  if  three  quarters  hatched,  a 
marsupial  mammal,  and  if  fully  hatched,  a  car- 
nivore, ungulate  or  primate.  No  other  animal 
of  his  size  and  weight  is  hatched  more  than  half 
as  long  as  man  is,  except  his  double  first  cousins, 
the  anthropoid  apes. 

Many  of  the  creatures  display  an  astonishing 
amount  of  intelligence  over  the  solution  of  this 
problem  before  settling  it  within  themselves.  Cer- 
tain birds,  like  the  ostrich,  for  instance,  as  is 
well  known,  lay  their  eggs  where  the  heat  of  the 
sun  is  convenient  for  their  development  in  the 
daytime,  and  only  sit  on  them  at  night.  Some 
birds,  like  the  famous  brush-turkey  of  New  Guinea, 
actually  reach  such  a  hen-wife  stage  of  intelligence 
as  to  build  huge  nests,  or  mounds,  of  decaying 
vegetable  material,  in  the  middle  of  which  they 
deposit  their  eggs  to  be  hatched  by  the  heat  given 
off  in  the  process  of  decay,  exactly  as  the  Egyptian 
chicken-farmer  of  to-day  builds  his  stack  of  straw 
and  horse-manure  and  buries  his  basket  «of  eggs 
in  the  centre  to  be  hatched  by  the  heat  of  its 
"sweating."  But  the  beautiful  simplicity  of  mak- 
ing the  body  of  the  mother  the  incubator  dawned 
late  on  the  animal  mind. 


WORSHIP  OF  THE  RACE  STREAM       231 

Hazy  glimmerings  of  the  idea  appear  very  far 
back  indeed  and  some  of  them  take  to  our  eyes 
singular  and  even  grotesque  forms.  In  the  first 
place,  some  of  the  earliest  and  crudest  experi- 
ments in  this  direction  were  made,  not  by  the  mother 
but  by  the  father.  In  other  words,  to  use  a  Hi- 
bernicism,  fathers  were  the  first  mothers. 

The  very  earliest  rudiments  of  attempts  at  self- 
hatching  of  the  eggs  among  vertebrates  occurs 
in  certain  forms  of  fishes,  notably  the  toad-fish  of 
our  southern  Atlantic  coast,  as  discovered  and 
most  painstakingly  worked  out  by  Gudger,  in 
which  the  male  fish  scoops  into  his  enormous  mouth 
the  eggs  as  they  are  laid  by  the  female  and,  tucking 
them  into  his  cheek-pouches,  i.  e.,  certain  recesses 
which  develop  between  his  gill-clefts,  shelters  them, 
not  in  the  hollow  of  his  hand,  but  of  his  mouth, 
until  they  are  fully  hatched.  Fancy  going  about 
with  a  mouthful  like  that  through  half  your  summer 
—  no  wonder  man  developed  into  the  silent  sex!  > 

The  next  stumble  in  this  direction  was  also  due 
to  male  initiative  and  came  a  little  higher  up  in 
the  scale,  in  those  familiar  but  unattractive  creatures, 
the  toads,  who  should  be  given  great  credit  for  it 
and  really  are  entitled  to  "wear  this  precious 
jewel  in  their  crowns."  In  the  species  which 
bears  the  proud  and  appropriate  name  of  Alytes 
obstetricans  the  eggs  are  laid  in  long  strings  by 
the  female  and  picked  up  by  the  male,  who  winds 


232  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

them  round  and  round  his  body,  especially  under 
his  armpits  and  round  his  waist,  and  thus  en- 
swathed  squats  about  in  nice  moist  corners  until 
the  young  toadlets  burst  from  their  coverings  and 
hop  away. 

Another  most  ingenious  gentleman  of  the  same 
family,  but  of  a  widely  different  species,  the  Suri- 
nam toad,  has  "a  brain  on  him"  like  a  Standard 
Oil  magnate,  for  he  actually  first  conceived  the 
brilliant  idea  of  suggesting  to  the  dull  mind  of 
womankind  that  she  might  take  a  part  in  the 
process,  for  which  original  conception  he  is  en- 
titled to  a  monument  of  triple  brass  from  the  grateful 
and  admiring  males  of  all  species  that  have  come 
after  him.  Think  what  would  have  been  our  lot 
if  the  whole  burden  of  incubation  had  been  thrown 
upon  our  shoulders  as  it  began  to  be,  instead  of 
deftly  shifted  by  this  Napoleonic  mind  on  to  the 
broader  and  much  more  capable  shoulders  of  the 
female.  We  had  better  give  the  ladies  what  they 
want  in  the  way  of  trifles  like  the  ballot  at  the 
earliest  moment  consistent  with  saving  our  faces 
lest  they  become  exasperated  and  demand  a  return 
to  first  principles  and  emancipation  in  this  regard 
also. 

This  gentleman  from  Surinam,  after,  probably, 
having  worn  an  undershirt  of  sticky  eggs  about 
as  long  as  he  cared  to,  hit  upon  the  bright  idea 
of  handing  the  work  back  to  the  female,  and  one 


WORSHIP  OF  THE  RACE  STREAM       233 

day  —  probably  when  she  wasn't  looking  —  peeled 
off  a  few  of  the  eggs  and  poked  them  slyly  in  be- 
tween some  loose  folds  of  skin  on  her  back.  The 
scheme  worked  admirably  —  for  the  male  and 
the  tadpoles  —  and  the  female  apparently  didn't 
much  mind  it,  but  submitted  to  the  imposition, 
until  to-day  in  this  species  it  is  the  fixed  and  regular 
habit  of  the  male  to  pick  up  the  eggs  as  they  are 
laid  by  the  female,  with  his  fore-paws,  and  poke 
them  into  scores  of  little  pouches  which  have  de- 
veloped all  over  the  skin  of  the  female's  back. 
Here  the  youngsters  comfortably  remain  until 
their  hatching  is  •  completed,  when  the  mother 
toad  bursts  out  into  an  eruption,  like  a  sort  of 
giant  small-pox,  and  literally  perspires  tadpoles 
at  every  pore. 

After  these  two  Newtonian  thinkers  comes  a  long, 
long  gap,  and  it  is  not  until  quite  high  up  in  the 
snakes,  at  the  very  top  of  the  serpentine  tree, 
in  fact  —  and  then  apparently  because  the  males 
were  not  intelligent  enough  to  volunteer  to  act  as 
pioneers  —  that  the  eggs  came  to  be  delayed  long 
enough  in  the  body  of  the  mother  before  being 
laid  to  undergo  more  or  less  complete  develop- 
ment. The  name  of  the  famous  viper,  for  instance, 
which  is  now  a  household  word,  is  simply  a  con- 
traction of  vivipara,  literally  "  alive-borning, "  from 
the  fact  that  the  eggs  were  delayed  so  long  in  the 
body  of  the  mother  before  being  laid  that  some 


234  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

of  the  embryos  hatched  under  cover  and  others 
within  a  few  days  of  having  been  deposited  in 
their  underground  nest. 

And  since  the  process  has  been  carefully  studied 
it  has  been  found  that  the  eggs  of  many  snakes 
are  laid  with  their  contained  "chickens"  in  quite 
an  advanced  stage  of  development,  so  that  it 
is  quite  difficult  to  get  snakes'  eggs  for  purposes  of 
embryological  study  in  any  but  the  latest  stages  of 
development.  In  fact,  in  not  a  few  snakes'  eggs, 
when  they  are  broken  for  the  purpose  of  making 
an  omelette,  you  find  the  youngsters  sufficiently 
grown  up  to  crawl  away,  and  if  they  happen  to 
belong  to  a  venomous  species  and  you  try  to  stop 
them  they  will  coil  up  and  strike  at  you  with  all 
the  viciousness  of  Medusa's  locks.  This  is  the 
most  appalling  —  and  only  —  instance  of  Original 
Sin  to  be  found  in  the  animal  kingdom;  and  from 
the  point  of  view  of  the  snakelets  it  is  of  course 
you  who  are  the  sinner. 

There  was  a  dim  foreshadowing  of  this  method 
even  farther  down  our  family  tree  among  certain 
perch-like  fishes  of  the  Pacific  Ocean,  among  whom 
some  of  the  mothers  retain  the  eggs  in  their  bodies 
until  the  young  fry  are  hatched  and  ready  to  swim. 
But  this  appears  to  have  been,  so  to  speak,  little 
more  than  oriental  inertia  on  the  part  of  the  mother 
and  led  nowhere,  so  far  as  further  perfection  of 
the  process  was  concerned. 


WORSHIP  OF  THE  RACE  STREAM       235 

It  was  not  until  Time's  noblest  product,  the 
last,  and  so  far  —  until  the  Superman  comes  — 
highest,  branch  and  crown  of  our  family  tree  is 
reached,  the  mammals,  or  warm-blooded  crea- 
tures, covered  with  fur  and  nursing  their  young, 
at  home,  so  to  speak,  is  universally  adopted  and 
carried  to  full  perfection.  It  is  now  so  familiar 
to  us  on  every  hand,  so  simple,  so  logical,  so  "nat- 
ural" as  we  say,  that  it  is  difficult  for  us  to  believe 
that  it  took  at  least  ten  or  fifteen  millions  of  years 
from  the  beginnings  of  life  to  reach  this  wonderful 
and  beautiful  method  of  race-continuation,  and 
from  two  to  four  million  years  more  to  elaborate 
and  perfect  the  idea. 

Even  among  the  earliest  mammals  the  process 
is  evidently  still  in  the  experimental  stage.  Up 
to  a  little  more  than  a  century  ago  it  was  generally 
supposed  that  the  earliest  forms  of  mammals  were 
the  marsupials,  or  pouched  animals,  so  called  from 
their  carrying  their  young  during  infancy  in  a 
curious  pouch  of  skin  developed  on  the  anterior 
surface  of  their  bodies.  But  with  the  discovery 
of  the  Lost  Continent  of  Australia,  which  had 
been  suddenly  cut  off  by  the  ocean  from  the  rest 
of  the  earth's  surface,  while  its  animal  inhabitants 
were  all  in  their  most  primitive  forms,  came  the 
uncovering  to  our  astonished  gaze,  not  merely 
of  scores  and  hundreds  of  new  species  of  mar- 
supials, but  also  of  two  or  three  small  groups  of 


236  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

even  more  primitive  and  extraordinary  mammals, 
covered  with  fur,  armed  with  claws  and  teeth, 
and  in  almost  every  respect  resembling  some  of 
our  smaller  burrowing  animals,  which  actually 
made  nests  and  laid  eggs.  One  of  them,  the  now 
famous  duck-mole,  or  duck-billed  platypus,  to  make 
the  weird  resemblance  to  a  bird  even  more  striking, 
had,  as  his  name  implies,  a  bill  like  a  duck. 

The  full  imperial  title  of  this  oldest  Father  of 
Men  is  Ornithorhyncus  paradoxus  vel  anatinus, 
the  most  interesting  and  important  single  creature 
that  ever  lived,  as  worthy  of  veneration  and  worship 
as  any  Greek  philosopher  or  Roman  emperor. 
Another  species  was  also  found  with  the  same 
singular  habit  of  egg-laying,  the  spiny  Echidna, 
a  small  animal  closely  resembling  a  hedge-hog 
or  a  porcupine.  By  the  side  of  their  classic  an- 
tiquity the  great  pyramid  becomes  as  modern  as 
a  sewing-machine. 

Both  Echidna  and  duck-mole,  however,  have 
the  root  of  the  matter  in  them  and  are  on  the  up- 
grade toward  full  mammalianism,  as  they  both 
occasionally  retain  the  eggs  within  their  bodies 
until  they  are  upon  the  point  of  hatching,  and 
both  tenderly  care  for  and  nurse  their  young. 

It  remained,  however,  for  the  next  grade  of  animal 
life,  the  marsupials,  to  take  the  last  important 
and  almost  final  step  in  the  direction  of  the  nur- 
ture of  the  young  by  substituting  for  a  large  egg 


WORSHIP  OF  THE  RACE  STREAM       237 

crammed  with  yoke  and  white  to  supply  food  for 
the  embryo  during  its  growth,  and  enclosed  by 
a  leathery,  horny,  or  chalky  shell,  a  very  small 
germ  cell  with  only  a  few  drops  of  yolk  food,  sur- 
rounded by  a  thin  and  delicate  envelope,  through 
which  it  can  draw  its  nourishment  directly  from  the 
blood  of  the  mother  while  remaining  within  her 
body. 

The  point  at  which  the  germ  cell  is,  so  to  speak, 
grafted  on  to  the  interior  of  the  body  of  the  mother 
is  called  the  placenta,  and  the  coil  of  blood  vessels 
which  form  between  this  and  the  body  of  the  de- 
veloping embryo  to  supply  it  with  nourishment 
is  known  as  the  umbilical  cord,  from  the  fact  that 
it  enters  the  body  of  the  embryo  at  the  centre 
of  its  anterior  surface.  But  even  their  courage 
seems  to  have  failed  them,  so  to  speak,  in  the  very 
middle  of  the  process,  for  instead  of  allowing  the 
young,  called  at  this  stage  the  embryo,  to  grow  and 
develop  within  the  body  of  the  mother,  fed  from 
her  tissues  through  the  veins  of  the  umbilical 
cord,  until  it  is  completely  developed  and  able  to 
shift  for  itself,  they  turn  it  out  less  than  half  hatched, 
as  it  were. 

The  young  kangaroo,  for  instance,  is  born  at  a 
stage  about  corresponding  to  the  third  or  fourth 
month  of  human  embryonic  development,  then 
picked  up  by  the  mother  and  stowed  away  safely 
in  her  marsupial  pouch.  Here  it  finds  the  nipple 


238  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

of  the  milk-gland  and  at  once  grasps  it  firmly  with 
the  only  muscle  of  its  body  that  is  thoroughly 
developed,  i.  e.,  the  constrictor,  or  ring-muscle 
of  the  mouth  and  lips.  It  attaches  itself  per- 
manently, and  the  tip  of  the  nipple  expands  within 
its  mouth  so  that  the  embryo  could  not  let  go 
if  it  would  and  is  thus  literally  "buttoned  on" 
to  its  source  of  supply  for  several  weeks,  until 
its  mouth  has  again  grown  larger  than  the  end  of 
the  nipple  and  it  disengages  itself  and  begins  to 
poke  its  head  out  of  the  pouch  to  see  the  world. 

This  curious  bit  of  life-history,  though  interesting 
enough  as  a  transition  stage,  would  at  first  sight 
appear  to  be  of  mere  academic  interest  were  it  not 
for  the  almost  incredible  fact  that  it  has  left  its 
mark  upon  the  throat  structure  of  every  mammal 
since.  If  you  will  open  your  own  mouth  wide 
before  the  mirror  you  will  see  hanging  down  from 
the  centre  of  your  palate  a  curious  little  tongue- 
like  process  about  half  an  inch  long,  known  as  the 
uvula.  It  is  of  no  earthly  utility  now,  except  to 
make  a  nuisance  of  itself  by  getting  inflamed, 
swelling  and  sagging  down  until  it  tickles  the 
larynx  and  makes  us  cough,  and  then  furnishing 
a  fee  to  the  laryngologist  for  its  amputation.  In 
the  young  marsupials,  however,  and  in  our  own 
embryos  at  about  the  fifth  month,  and  in  the  young 
sucklings  of  several  animals,  notably  the  horse, 
this  uvula  is  a  broad,  square-tipped  curtain  of 


WORSHIP  OF  THE  RACE  STREAM       239 

muscle  hanging  down  from  the  palate  and  grasping 
firmly  the  epiglottis,  or  shield  of  gristle,  which 
stands  up  in  front  of  the  opening  of  the  larynx, 
or  voice-box.  When  this  connection  has  been 
established,  it  allows  a  continual  stream  to  flow 
down  the  throat  on  either  side  of  the  opening  of 
the  windpipe,  without  any  effort  on  the  part  of  the 
youngster  and  without  any  danger  of  his  choking. 

Nature  never  forgets  an  old  trick,  and  this 
curious  waterproof  continuous  passage  down  the 
throat  on  either  side  of  the  windpipe  revives  again 
in  all  its  perfection  in  the  throat  of  the  young 
of  a  very  far-wandered  mammal,  the  whale.  This 
creature,  living  in  the  water,  but  warm-blooded 
and  nursing  its  young  like  any  other  mammal, 
must  arrange  for  the  swallowing  of  the  milk  by 
the  latter  by  some  other  means  than  suction,  as 
this  requires  a  drawing  in  of  a  fresh  supply  of  air. 
Nature  meets  this  emergency  by  providing  the 
young  whale  with  this  waterproof  palate-larynx 
combination,  and  the  milk-gland  of  the  mother 
with  a  compressor-muscle  which  squirts  the  liquid 
in  a  steady  stream  down  the  youngster's  throat. 

But  with  the  discovery  by  some  either  more  or 
less  enterprising  than  usual  kangaroo-mother  that 
it  was  "just  as  good,  and  far  less  trouble,"  to  carry 
the  embryo  on  to  its  full  stage  of  development  at 
home  without  bothering  herself  with  a  pouch  and 
its  exceedingly  heavy  and  troublesome  burden 


24o  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

—  for  the  young  "Joey-kangaroo"  stays  in  his 
pouch  and  is  carried  about,  like  a  young  lord  in 
his  carriage,  until  he  is  nearly  one  third  as  big 
as  his  mother  —  the  final  and  perfected  stage  of 
the  race-continuing  process  was  reached.  Final, 
that  is,  unless  Science,  in  response  to  the  woman's 
demands  for  complete  emancipation  from  the 
burdens  and  responsibilities  of  sex,  invents  some 
wonderfully  devised  and  perfect  incubator  in  which 
the  human  embryo  can  be  hatched  as  chickens 
are  now,  and  desirable  human  strains  may  be 
combined  and  propagated  outside  of  the  body 
freely  and  with  complete  indifference  to  sentimental 
and  conventional  considerations. 

The  only  changes  from  this  on  have  been  a  gradual 
lengthening  of  the  period  of  incubation  or  internal 
care  of  the  young,  which  has  expanded  from  the 
six  or  seven  days  of  the  early  mammalian  forms 
to  the  nine,  ten  or  eleven  months  of  the  highest 
forms.  This  has  been  found  apparently  the  longest 
period  consistent  with  the  welfare  of  the  species, 
the  limit  being  probably  due  to  the  fact  that  any 
further  extension  of  the  period  would  involve 
the  bearing  of  the  young  by  the  mother  for  more 
than  a  year  and  consequently  through  two  seasonal 
periods  of  hardship  and  famine,  winter  or  summer 
as  the  case  may  be,  which  would  be  too  great  a 
risk. 

It  is  worth  while  noting  perhaps  that  the  breed- 


WORSHIP  OF  THE  RACE  STREAM       241 

ing  season,  or  time  of  birth,  of  the  young  in  animals 
almost  universally  corresponds  with  that  period 
of  the  year  at  which  food  for  the  mother  will  be 
most  abundant  during  the  nursing  period,  or  at  which 
there  will  be  the  best  supply  of  food,  or  the  best 
climatic  conditions  for  the  young  as  soon  as  they 
begin  to  forage  for  themselves.  Fawns  and  the 
calves  of  wild  cattle,  for  instance,-  are  born  in  the 
very  early  spring,  so  that  there  will  be  an  abundant 
supply  of  grass  for  the  mothers  at  the  time  when 
the  strain  of  nursing  will  begin  to  tell  and  also  for 
the  youngsters  when  they  begin  to  browse. 

But  even  this  lengthening  of  the  time  is  not 
sufficient  to  allow  of  the  care  and  training  which 
is  needed  for  the  development  of  the  very  best  and 
most  successful  types  of  "children";  so  to  meet 
this,  the  period  of  infancy,  or  time  of  dependence 
on  the  parents  after  birth,  is  even  more  markedly 
increased. 

The  young  of  the  lower  animals  are  born  like 
those  of  the  lower  birds  (ostriches,  chickens,  etc.), 
with  all  their  wits  and  senses  about  them,  ready 
to  run  and  look  out  for  themselves  almost  from 
birth.  But  as  we  rise  in  the  scale,  the  young  at 
birth  gradually  become  more  and  more  helpless. 
Young  birds  are  born  with  their  eyes  closed  and 
destitute  of  feathers,  young  mammals  half  blind, 
without  any  fur  or  hairy  coating,  and  capable  of 
doing  little  but  crawl  and  whimper;  and  finally 


242  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

the  human  infant  is  born  with  his  eyes  open,  it 
is  true,  much  to  the  surprise  of  Landseer  and  other 
dog-loving  bachelors,  but  without  a  particle  of 
natural  protection  in  the  way  of  furry  clothing, 
and  so  helpless  and  dependent  that  he  is  unable 
to  walk  or  stand  alone  for  a  year  or  more,  and 
does  not  arrive  at  full  maturity  until  he  is  twenty- 
five  years  old. 

With  this  step  education  is  born,  which  means 
much  to  the  child,  and  even  more  to  the  parents 
and  to  the  community.  The  child  is  the  greatest 
teacher  ever  born,  and  it  is  no  mere  mystic  figure 
of  speech  that  in  the  upward  march  of  civilization 
"a  little  child  shall  lead  them."  The  true  millen- 
nium is  just  dawning  —  the  Day  of  the  Child. 
War  marked  the  day  of  the  Man,  religion  the  day 
of  the  Woman,  with  the  Day  of  the  Child  will 
come  the  service  and  the  brotherhood  of  man. 
When  we  recognize  that  our  highest  allegiance  is 
to  the  Child,  the  coming  generation,  as  represent- 
ing the  future  of  the  race,  then  Heaven  will  "come 
true"  upon  earth,  and  we  won't  have  to  die  to 
reach  it. 

Man,  so  far  as  his  bodily  structure  and  functions 
are  concerned,  is  but  the  highest,  the  most  ex- 
quisitely contrived  and  the  most  beautiful  of  the 
animals.  Small  wonder  that  the  mating  impulse, 
which  secures  the  continuance  of  the  race,  should 
exercise  an  influence  over  his  emotions  and  con- 


WORSHIP  OF  THE  RACE  STREAM      243 

duct  which  is  powerful  in  proportion  to  its  dignity 
and  profound  importance.  But  there  is  no  need 
to  exaggerate  the  power  of  its  sway,  either  for  good 
or  for  evil,  as  is  usually  done.  Notwithstanding 
the  ecstatic  paeons  of  the  poet  and  the  trouba- 
dour on  the  one  hand,  and  the  equally  unbalanced 
reprobations  and  denunciations  of  the  priest  and 
the  moralist  upon  the  other,  it  is  extremely  doubtful, 
as  a  matter  of  cold  biological  fact,  whether  the 
mating  impulse,  or  romantic  love,  ever  at  any 
period  of  life  controls  or  dominates  more  than 
one  tenth  of  the  activities  and  conduct  of  man- 
kind. Venus,  the  goddess  of  perpetual  romantic 
love,  at  one  end  of  the  scale,  and  the  Vestal  Virgin, 
or  the  nun,  as  the  emblem  of  perpetual  frigidity 
and  renunciation,  at  the  other,  are  both  equally 
untrue  to  life  and  abnormal;  and  both  deeply 
tinged  with  insanity. 

In  the  first  place,  probably  not  more  than  one 
man  or  woman  in  ten  is  capable  of  developing 
a  really  high  class  attack  of  the  " grande  passion," 
such  as  would  be  fit  to  go  into  a  novel  or  become 
the  subject  of  a  poem.  Secondly,  the  vast  ma- 
jority of  men  and  women  fall  in  love,  or  imagine 
themselves  to  be  so,  which  is  the  same  thing,  not 
once  and  forever,  so  that  they  will  be  blighted 
beings  ever  after  if  they  fail  to  win  the  prize,  but 
ten,  or  a  dozen  times,  once  or  more  a  year  in  fact, 
all  through  their  salad  days,  until  the  "right  per- 


244  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

son"  comes  along  and  puts  an  end  to  the  continuous 
performance  by  marrying  them.  Then  of  course 
this  was  the  only  case  of  "true"  love,  all  the  others 
being  mere  imitations.  Whereas,  as  a  matter  of 
fact,  any  one  of  the  preceding  attacks,  third,  seventh, 
or  ninth,  as  the  case  may  be,  would  have  proved 
just  as  "true"  if  it  had  happened  to  end  in  mar- 
riage. 

The  ease  with  which  boys  and  girls  fall  in  love 
is  only  equalled  by  the  exquisite  facility  with  which 
they  fall  out  again;  and  there  is  never  need  for  any 
one  to  lose  their  sense  of  proportion  and  humour 
and  imagine  that  their  lives  will  forever  after  be 
a  blank  and  a  desert  drear  if  they  cannot  get  the 
particular  person  for  their  life  partner  who  hap- 
pens to  embody  for  them  all  the  charms  and  the 
virtues  of  the  opposite  sex  in  that  particular  week 
of  the  May  or  June  of  their  life. 

In  fact,  it  should  never  be  forgotten  by  those 
under  the  sway  of  this  impulse,  first,  that  when 
this  attack  passes  they  will  probably  have  several 
others,  equally  severe  and  enjoyable,  and,  second, 
that  as  nature  has  laid  down  through  all  the  aeons 
of  the  past  and  will  quickly  teach  them  in  the  bitter 
school  of  experience,  if  they  are  blind  to  her  warn- 
ings, the  real  purpose  and  meaning  of  this  im- 
pulse is  not  the  enjoyment  or  necessarily  the  happi- 
ness of  the  individual,  although  this  is  usually 
enormously  increased  and  best  secured  thereby, 


WORSHIP  OF  THE  RACE  STREAM       245 

but  the  welfare  of  the  race  and  the  interests  of  the 
next  generation. 

The  only  considerations  which  ought  to  be 
allowed  to  influence  our  choice  of  a  partner  for 
life  are  those  rising  out  of  the  fitness,  physical, 
mental  and  moral,  of  the  object  of  our  affections 
to  be  the  father,  or  mother,  of  our  children.  If 
we  can  feel  sure  upon  this  point,  then  it  is  usually 
safe  to  follow  our  impulses  .  with  little  regard  to 
what  others  may  think. 

No  other  consideration  should  count  in  this 
greatest  throw  in  the  game  of  life,  and  when  a 
real  man  marries  a  true  woman,  whom  he  both 
loves  and  can  respect,  happiness  and  success  are 
nearly  sure  to  follow,  regardless  of  race,  rank, 
social  position,  or  money.  The  charm  and  at- 
traction of  man  for  woman  and  woman  for  man 
are  so  infinite  and  inexhaustible,  they  meet  and  fill 
each  other's  needs  and  requirements  in  such  a 
multitude  of  ways  and  such  myriads  of  aspects 
of  life,  that  if  they  but  join  hands  upon  a  basis 
of  mutual  affection  and  repect,  with  good  char- 
acter, good  health  and  good  temper,  and  the  dis- 
parity between  their  ages  and  dispositions  be  not 
abnormally  great,  nine  times  out  of  ten  they  will 
both  congratulate  themselves  upon  their  good 
fortune  until  the  day  of  their  death. 

Although  there  are  plenty  of  delightful  instances 
of  love  at  first  sight  which  burns  without  wavering 


246  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

or  fading  "until  death  doth  part,"  yet  these  form 
but  nature's  high  and  chosen  aristocracy  of  love; 
and  the  main  thing  for  all  youths  and  maidens 
to  remember  is  that  if  they  refuse  to  accept  an 
unfit  mate,  no  matter  how  attractive  or  how 
rich  or  how  titled,  they  need  fear  little  difficulty 
in  falling  in  love  with  the  right  and  fit  one, 
whenever  he  or  she  shall  appear.  Also,  that  there 
are  as  good  fish  in  the  sea  as  ever  were  caught, 
and  that  the  man  or  woman  who  goes  down  to  the 
grave  single  for  lack  of  at  least  four  or  five  oppor- 
tunities to  marry  is  as  rare  as  the  proverbial  hen's 
teeth. 

This  high  and  noble  standard  of  choice  is  even 
more  obligatory  upon  us  to-day  than  ever  before, 
for  the  reason  that  we  now  know  that  mental  and 
moral  characters  are  inherited  just  as  definitely 
and  almost  as  surely  as  physical  ones;  that  as 
the  parents  and  grandparents  are  so  will  the  chil- 
dren and  grandchildren  be.  It  therefore  becomes 
our  deepest  and  most  binding  biological  duty  to 
give  to  our  children  the  best  and  the  cleanest 
and  the  bravest  inheritance  that  we  can  possibly 
secure  for  them;  indeed  we  have  no  right  to  bring 
children  into  the  world  with  any  other. 

Nature  after  millions  of  years  of  experiments 
has  determined  that  the  best  form  of  union,  re- 
sulting in  the  birth  and  upbringing  of  the  highest  and 
fittest  type  of  children,  is  the  union  between  one 


WORSHIP  OF  THE  RACE  STREAM       247 

man  and  one  woman  for  life,  or  at  least  for  the  whole 
long  period  of  infancy  and  training,  which,  starting 
at  the  maturity  of  the  parents,  means  practically 
the  same  thing.  It  must  not  for  a  moment  be 
imagined  that  monogamic  marriage  is  a  thing  of 
purely  human  device,  let  alone  of  legal,  ecclesiastic 
or  social  invention.  It  was  established  by  ex- 
periment and  had  proved  its  superiority  in  the 
animals  millions  of  years  before  man  appeared 
upon  the  scene. 

Not  only  is  it  a  sin  against  nature  and  treason 
to  our  best  instincts  to  mate  for  considerations 
of  money  or  rank  or  social  position,  but  even  more 
so,  of  course,  to  exercise  this  wondrous  power 
for  any  other  purpose  than  that  for  which  it  orig- 
inally grew  up  —  the  continuance  of  the  race 
stream.  Nowhere  else  in  the  world  does  nature 
preach  a  clearer,  more  unmistakable  message  of 
clean  living,  of  high  thinking,  of  noble  self-control. 
Control,  as  over  all  our  other  natural  instincts  and  im- 
pulses, not  because  self-denial  is  a  virtue  in  itself 
—  far  from  it  —  but  control  in  order  to  enable  us 
to  fulfil  the  impulse  in  the  highest,  most  efficient, 
most  perfect  manner,  which  is  also  in  the  long 
run  far  the  happiest,  as  well  as  purest.  Faith- 
lessness to  this  standard  brings  invariably  with 
it  its  own  punishment,  and  always  has  done  so 
through  all  the  pages  of  human  history.  Racial 
morality,  like  all  other  true  morality,  is  inherent 


248  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

and    self-existent,    and    needs    no    conventions    of 
society  or  laws  of  man  to  enforce  it. 

If  any  other  warning  were  needed,  nature  has 
placed  on  either  side  of  the  path  of  rectitude,  like 
the  angels  with  flaming  swords  at  the  gate  of  the 
Garden  of  Eden,  two  of  the  most  merciless,  the 
most  destructive  and  disgraceful  of  diseases.  But 
their  warning  is  only  for  the  dullest  and  basest 
ears  and  the  most  clouded  eyes;  and  the  depiction 
of  their  dangers  is  as  little  needed  by  high-minded, 
clean-living,  race-worshipping  youths  and  maidens 
as  the  terrors  and  penalties  of  the  criminal  code  are 
for  the  majority  of  mankind. 


CHAPTER  XII 

RELUCTANT    PARENTAGE 

EVERYTHING  in  this  world  is  comparative 
-  nothing  absolute.  The  most  important 
question  about  a  condition  is  not  so  much 
is  it  good  or  bad,  injurious  or  beneficent  in  itself, 
but  is  it  better  or  worse  than  the  state  which  pre- 
ceded it?  And  the  second  is  like  unto  it,  does  it 
tend  to  make  the  future  conditions  better  or  worse 
than  the  present?  In  other  words,  it  is  not  so 
much  where  we  stand,  as  whether  we  are  on  an  up- 
grade or  down.  This  is  peculiarly  true  of  that  much- 
vexed  problem  popularly  known  as  race  suicide. 
The  mere  coining  of  the  name  was  a  real  public 
service.  It  set  forth  so  clearly  and  vividly  the  possi- 
ble dangers  which  might  result  from  the  prevalent 
course,  or  rather  drift,  in  respect  to  the  first  and 
greatest  commandment  given  in  Holy  Writ:  "Be 
fruitful  and  multiply,  and  replenish  the  earth." 
Clearly  any  policy  or  lack  of  it  which  diminishes  the 
reproduction  of  the  more  desirable  elements  in  a 
race  or  community,  and  leaves  the  lion's  share  of 
the  growth  in  population  to  be  contributed  by  the 
less  desirable  elements,  is  fraught  with  danger  to 

249 


WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

the  future  of  the  race.  It  was  also  of  great  value  in 
emphasizing  and  publicly  asserting  the  great  moral 
law,  founded  upon  the  broadest  and  most  ancient, 
not  merely  of  religious  but  of  biologic  bases,  that 
our  first  and  greatest  duty  is  not  to  ourselves  but  to 
the  race.  The  race  has  the  first  mortgage  upon  us 
and  our  powers,  and  has  had  ever  since  we  lay  in 
the  ooze  of  the  tide  flats  and  vibrated  to  the  pulses 
of  the  sea. 

To-day,  Jew  and  Gentile,  Christian  and  Agnostic, 
Philosopher  and  Scientist,  all  unite  in  holding  that 
the  highest  of  all  laws,  before  which  all  others  should 
bend  in  consideration,  is  the  welfare  of  the  nation, 
the  future  of  the  race.  Brought  before  the  bar  of 
this  tribunal,  it  would  appear  as  though  our  modern 
attitude  toward  race  fruitfulness  was  deserving  of 
severe  condemnation,  and  of  little  else.  And  in  part 
there  can  be  no  question  that  it  is.  That  a  consid- 
erable and  increasing  element  of  our  population  is 
becoming  unwilling  to  rear  children  cannot  be 
seriously  denied  and,  in  so  far  as  this  unwillingness 
is  due  to  a  selfish  shirking  of  the  expense,  labour  and 
responsibility  involved,  as  expressed  in  the  familiar 
phrases,  "Don't  want  to  be  bothered  with  children, " 
"Children  interfere  with  your  having  a  good  time," 
it  should  be  visited  with  the  severest  reprobation. 
Any  man  or  woman  who  solely,  or  even  chiefly, 
upon  such  grounds,  refuses  the  duties  of  parentage 
is  a  traitor  to  the  race  and  a  coward  and  a  skulker 


RELUCTANT  PARENTAGE  251 

in  the  battle  of  life,  and  should  be  branded  and 
despised  accordingly. 

But  while  this  motive  unfortunately  exists  and 
assumes  a  most  unpleasant  conspicuousness  in  all 
public  discussions  of  this  question,  and  is  avowed 
with  distressingly  cynical  frankness  in  most  private 
ones,  it  is  to  be  doubted  whether  it  is  really  respon- 
sible for  more  than  a  very  small  percentage  of  the 
tendency  which  it  is  alleged  to  explain.  Any 
family  physician  can  tell  you  of  scores  of  young 
married  couples  who  have  frankly  avowed  this 
attitude,  but  the  vast  majority  of  them  became 
ashamed  of  it  later.  Many  times  when  it  was  per- 
haps too  late  they  would  have  given  anything  to  be 
able  to  undo  the  results  of  their  selfish  and  short- 
sighted folly.  It  may  be  pointed  out,  in  passing, 
that  the  crime  of  such  offenders  against  the  higher 
racial  morality  is  self-punishing.  It  prevents  the 
continuation  of  the  breed  of  this  stamp  of  individuals, 
which  is  a  blessing  rather  than  a  curse  to  the  com- 
munity* 

As  Burke  long  ago  pointed  out,  "It  is  impossible 
to  frame  an  indictment  against  an  entire  people," 
least  of  all  on  such  a  low  and  discreditable  a  ground 
as  this;  and  we  must  look  further  for  the  real  forces 
which  chiefly  underlie  the  tendency.  In  my  judg- 
ment there  can  be  little  serious  question  that  at 
least  two  thirds  of  the  modern  unwillingness  to 
bear  children  is  based  upon  considerations  affecting 


252  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

the  welfare  of  the  child,  rather  than  that  of  the 
parents.  It  is  of  course  an  open  question  whether 
much  of  this  feeling  is  not  mistaken  and  from,  a 
rational  point  of  view  another  form  of  selfishness; 
but  it  is  a  perfectly  legitimate  and  honourable  motive 
and  the  question  it  raises  one  which  may  be  frankly 
and  freely  discussed  upon  its  merits  without  any 
imputation  of  discredit,  or  making  us  despair  of  the 
future  of  the  race.  In  fact,  the  only  difference  be- 
tween the  good  old  times  of  large  families  and  the 
present  era  of  smaller  ones  is  that  nowadays  we 
face  the  problem  squarely,  while  formerly  it  was 
dodged  and  left  to  settle  itself. 

There  are  few  problems  which  are  surrounded 
by  a  thicker  fog  of  misconceptions.  The  first  and 
most  ludicrous  of  these  is  the  idea  that  the  problem 
is  a  new  one.  It  dates  back  to  times  long  before 
the  dawn  of  history.  Instead  of  being  a  mark  of 
the  decadence  due  to  civilization,  it  was  not  until 
civilization  was  well  advanced  that  infanticide  was 
ever  regarded  as  a  crime  at  all.  Practically  all 
savage,  most  barbarous,  and  many  civilized  tribes, 
such  for  instance  as  the  much-boasted  Spartans, 
habitually  and  publicly  abandoned  or  destroyed 
superfluous  infants  without  the  slightest  compunc- 
tion and  as  a  matter  of  routine.  The  life  of  the 
child  absolutely  belonged  to  the  father,  and  he  could 
dispose  of  it  as  he  would,  not  only  without  hindrance, 
but  without  criticism.  Even  so  well  developed  a 


RELUCTANT  PARENTAGE      253 

code  as  the  early  Roman  Law  formally  recognized 
this  power  of  the  father  over  his  children  until  they 
had  passed  their  majority.  In  many  tribes,  female 
infants  were  habitually  destroyed  unless  concealed 
by  their  mothers,  because  they  were  regarded  as 
useless  incumbrances  in  a  community  of  warriors. 
The  practice  even  developed  into  the  dignity  of  a 
ceremonial  or  religious  rite,  and  conferred  merit 
and  credit  upon  those  who  followed  it.  Instead  of 
infanticide  in  every  imaginable  form  being  a  modern 
crime,  it  is  one  of  the  oldest  iniquities  in  the  world. 
In  fact  for  thousands  upon  thousands  of  years  it 
was  considered  a  virtue.  While  as  to  methods  of 
preventing  or  terminating  conception,  many  a  tribe 
of  Australian  black  fellows,  running  naked  and  killing 
snakes  with  their  teeth,  could  give  startling  pointers 
to  -our  most  expert  abortionists  of  the  twentieth 
century.  In  short,  one  of  the  best  and  most  foun- 
dational  characterizations  that  can  be  given  of  the 
three  great  stages  of  civilization  is  that  savage  means 
with  stationary  or  diminishing  numbers,  barbarous 
with  slowly  increasing,  and  civilized  with  rapidly 
increasing  population.  Whatever  criminal  charges 
may  be  urged  against  civilization  it  certainly  has 
not  resulted  in  diminishing  the  fertility  and  rate  of 
increase  of  the  race.  Over  against  all  the  jere- 
miads and  wailings  about  decadence,  diminishing 
fertility,  declining  birth  rates,  race  suicide  and  the 
like,  the  cold,  massive,  indigestible  fact  remains, 


254  "WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

solid  as  a  granite  obelisk,  that  the  rate  of  increase  of 
any  known  civilized  community  is  greater  than  that 
of  any  known  savage  or  barbarous  one;  and  that 
with  the  single  exception  of  France,  those  nations 
that  stand  highest  in  the  scale  of  civilization  are 
increasing  their  population  at  the  most  rapid  rate. 
The  population  of  England  for  instance  has  increased 
in  the  past  fifty  years  more  than  100  per  cent. ;  that 
of  Germany  nearly  as  much,  while  our  own  land, 
which  is  held  up,  and  probably  justly,  as  the  worst 
offender  of  all  in  the  matter  of  intentional  race 
suicide  has  grown  in  the  last  thirty  years  from  fifty 
millions  to  ninety  millions,  only  twelve  millions  of 
which  was  due  to  immigration.  So  far  as  the  tes- 
timony of  statistics  goes,  race  suicide,  in  the  sense 
of  race  extermination  is  as  remote  as  the  millenium, 
and  as  arrant  a  bugaboo  as  the  Jabberwock. 

Of  course  it  will  be  instantly  objected  there  are 
scores  of  other  factors  besides  the  mere  number  of 
children  born  per  family,  which  play  a  part  in  this 
rapid  increase  of  civilized  communities.  The  aboli- 
tion of  famines,  for  instance,  by  the  increasing 
abundance  of  food  supply  and  improvements  in 
transportation,  the  victories  over  and  harnessing  to 
human  use  of  the  great  world  forces  —  wind,  steam, 
water  and  electricity;  the  vastly  increasing  knowledge 
of  the  nature  and  causation  of  disease,  enabling  us  to 
stamp  out  epidemics  and  lower  the  death  rates. 
All  these  have  to  be  taken  into  consideration. 


RELUCTANT  PARENTAGE      255 

Precisely;  but  the  point  is  that  all  these  strides  of 
progress  are  a  product  of  precisely  the  same  intelli- 
gence which  leads  the  race  seriously  to  consider  the 
problem  —  to  bear  or  not  to  bear  children.  We 
have  intelligently  and  voluntarily  diminished  the 
size  of  our  families  in  order  that  we  may  be  able  to 
feed,  to  educate,  to  protect  better  and  more  abun- 
dantly, those  children  that  are  born.  And  Wis- 
dom is  abundantly  justified  of  both  her  children. 
Within  reasonable  limits  and  indeed  so  far  as  the 
progress  has  ever  gone  hitherto,  the  diminished  size 
of  the  family  has  been  more  than  compensated  for 
by  the  increased  vigour,  health  and  efficiency  of 
the  children  reared,  so  that  the  net  result  has 
been  to  lessen  the  waste  of  life  and  to  increase  the 
growth  of  population  instead  of  diminishing  it.  A 
high  birth  rate  is  anything  but  a  sign  of  high  racial 
vigour  or  national  progress.  Indeed,  by  apparent 
paradox,  it  is  a  commonplace  of  vital  statistics  that 
a  high  birth  rate,  almost  invariably  means  a  high 
death  rate  and  particularly  a  huge  infant  mortality. 
This  is  true  not  merely  of  different  nations  and  of 
races  in  different  regions  and  climates,  but  it  is 
also  true  of  superior  and  inferior  races  living  side 
by  side  and  of  the  different  classes  in  the  same 
nation.  Our  Negro  and  Indian  populations  in  this 
country,  for  instance,  have  a  higher  birth  rate 
than  that  of  the  surrounding  white  population, 
but  such  an  enormously  increased  death  rate  and 


256  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

infant  mortality  that  it  more  than  neutralizes  this, 
so  that  the  Negro  is  increasing  more  slowly  than  the 
white  man,  if  indeed  he  be  not  at  a  standstill; 
while  the  Indian  is  steadily  declining  in  numbers. 
The  birth  rate  of  our  slums  population  is  high, 
but  their  death  rate  rises  in  proportion,  so  that  the 
net  increase  is  only  slightly  greater  than  that  of  the 
more  fortunate  classes  of  our  population.  I  am  un- 
able to  find  any  adequate  basis  whatever  for  the 
dread  that  there  is  any  danger  of  the  more  intelligent, 
more  efficient  and  more  desirable  elements  of  the 
population  being  physically  swamped  by  the  high 
birth  rate  of  the  weaker  and  less  desirable  classes. 
If  such  an  event  should  occur,  it  would  be  absolutely 
at  variance  with  all  the  experience  of  the  past  and 
with  the  whole  tendency  of  evolution.  To  put  it 
brutally  and  frankly,  from  a  racial  point  of  view,  the 
question  is  not  of  limiting  or  not  limiting  the  number 
of  children,  but  of  how  it  shall  be  limited.  Our  choice 
practically  and  racially  lies  between  preventing  their 
coming  into  existence  or  weeding  them  out  by  star- 
vation, by  disease  and  neglect  after  they  have  been 
born.  Which  is  the  more  humane  method? 

The  second  great  misconception  which  confuses 
most  discussions  of  this  problem  is  that  this  modern 
tendency  to  limit  the  size  of  families  is  a  mark  of 
moral  degeneracy,  of  lack  of  patriotism,  of  unwill- 
ingness to  sacrifice  one's  own  comfort  for  the  good  of 
the  race.  We  are  told  from  many  a  pulpit  that  the 


RELUCTANT  PARENTAGE  257 

modern  woman  is  becoming  forgetful  of  her  chief 
and  highest  duty,  to  rear  children  in  the  fear  of  the 
Lord:  or  that,  if  she  recognizes  this  duty,  she  is 
rebellious  against  it.  And  we  are  pointed  admiringly 
and  regretfully  to  the  good  old  days  of  two  hundred, 
one  hundred,  even  fifty  years  ago  when  mothers 
saw  their  duty  to  Church  and  State  and  meekly 
performed  it  in  the  shape  of  families  of  -eight, 
twelve,  and  fifteen  children. 

There  are  only  two  defects  in  this  beautiful  dream 
of  the  days  of  old  when  "none  were  for  the  party, 
and  all  for  the  State;  and  the  rich  man  helped  the 
poor  and  the  poor  man  loved  the  great."  The 
first  is  that  neither  the  fathers  nor  the  mothers  of 
these  huge  families  had  any  particular  intention, 
or  indeed  idea  of  sacrificing  themselves  for  the  race, 
or  doing  their  duty  by  the  community;  they  were 
simply  following  their  instincts  and  taking  the 
consequences  more  or  less  patiently  —  and  stupidly. 
The  second  is  that,  with  the  exception  of  the 
small  wealthy  class,  these  large  families,  if  valued 
at  all,  were  valued  chiefly  as  a  source  of  income 
to  their  parents  from  the  earnings  or  work  of 
the  children  during  their  time  of  dependence.  We 
rightly  denounce  the  modern  sweat  shop  and  the 
factory  or  mine  crowded  with  child-workers,  but 
let  us  remember  that  a  larger  percentage  of  the 
children  of  these  huge  families  among  the  working 
and  farming  classes  a  hundred  years  ago  were 


258  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

underfed,  overworked,  beaten  and  ill-treated,  stu  ted 
physically,  and  deformed  morally,  than  of  the  chil- 
dren of  any  civilized  community  to-day,  even  in 
factory  towns.  We  may  mourn  over  the  decadence 
of  family  discipline  and  bewail  the  waning  sanctity 
of  the  marriage  tie,  but  the  conditions  which  pre- 
vailed in  many  and  many  a  model  family  of  the  large 
and  hard-working  type,  common  a  century  ago,  were 
crueller  and  more  intolerable  in  their  injustice  than 
eight  tenths  of  what  is  revealed  in  our  divorce 
courts  to-day. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  scarcely  the  slightest  trace  of 
intelligence  or  intention,  or  of  deliberate  forethought, 
entered  into  the  production  of  these  ideal,  big,  old- 
fashioned  families,  except  where  the  parents  ex- 
pected to  profit  by  the  labour  or  wages  of  their 
offspring.  How  many  of  them,  for  instance,  would 
have  come  into  existence  if  the  mother  had  been 
for  a  moment  consulted  about  the  matter?  How 
many  of  the  surplus  children,  whose  lives  must 
inevitably  be  wasted  in  the  attempt  to  rear  ten 
children  upon  means  adequate  for  four,  would  vote 
for  the  continuance  of  such  a  plan  if  they  could 
be  consulted?  The  parents  to-day  who  are  the 
strongest  advocates  of  small  families  are  those 
who  were  the  members  of  large  ones  themselves. 
As  a  friend  of  mine,  humorously  but  practically 
expressed  it:  "There  were  ten  of  us,  and  when 
father  brought  home  candy,  we  just  got  a  lick 


RELUCTANT  PARENTAGE      259 

apiece:  I  am  going  to  see  that  my  children  get  a 
whole  stick  each!" 

The  only  difference  between  the  selfish  parents 
of  to-day  and  the  self-sacrificing,  devoted  ones  of  a 
century  ago  is  that  the  former  think  about  the 
problem  while  the  latter  didn't. 

The  third  great  misconception  which  befogs  this 
question  is  that  such  tendency  toward  race  suicide 
which  exists  is  chiefly  the  fault  of  the  woman  in 
the  case.  This  is  little  better  than  the  belated 
echo  from  the  Garden  of  Eden:  "It  was  the  woman 
that  thou  gavest  me!"  The  prospective  male 
parent  of  to-day  is  just  as  keenly  alive  as  his  mate 
to  the  burdens  and  handicaps  imposed  upon  him 
by  an  unnecessary  profusion  of  offspring  and, 
what  is  more  important  and  fundamental,  to  the 
serious  injustice  committed  against  the  child  brought 
into  the  keen,  remorseless  struggle  for  existence 
without  the  bestof  rearing,  training  and  equipment. 
It  is  true  that  the  heavier  physical  burden  and 
penalty  of  child-bearing  and  child-rearing  falls 
upon  the  mother,  but  this  is  more  than  offset  by 
the  depth  and  power  of  her  maternal  instincts. 

Women  may  shrink  from  and  evade  and  postpone 
even  indefinitely  the  risks  and  responsibilities  of 
motherhood  but  the  woman  who  would  deliberately 
and  contentedly  face  the  prospect  of  going  through 
life  without  ever  having  a  chick  or  a  child  of  her  own 
is  distinctly  a  rara  avis.  And  when  you  get  down 


260  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

to  the  real  feelings  and  the  bottommost  thought  of 
even  the  most  blase  man  of  the  world,  or  the  most 
inveterate  old  bachelor  of  clubdom,  you  will  stumble 
upon  a  primal  longing  for  a  child  of  his  own  to 
carry  his  name  and  keep  up  the  traditions  of  the 
family,  or  a  sense  of  secret  bitterness  and  disap- 
pointment if  this  has  been  denied  him. 

The  race-continuing  instinct  is  the  deepest  and 
most  primitive  in  our  nature,  and  the  more  we 
strive  to  smother  or  defy  it  the  more  surely  it  will 
wreak  its  vengeance  upon  us.  A  man  or  woman 
without  children  or  desire  for  any  is  as  rare  and 
contemptible  as  a  man  without  a  country.  The 
man  who  prefers  his  club  and  the  woman  who  pre- 
fers her  lap-dog  to  children  exist,  but  they  have 
violated  the  highest  law  of  racial  morality  and  the 
deepest  instinct  of  their  being,  and  they  pay  the 
penalty  in  disease,  debauchery  and  disgrace,  and 
the  loathing  contempt  of  all  right-minded  people  • — 
a  contempt  so  deep  that  it  finds  difficulty  in  ex- 
pressing itself  in  words.  Our  consolation,  from  a 
racial  point  of  view,  is  that  in  their  case  the  law  of 
the  elimination  of  the  unfit  is  producing  one  of  its 
most  striking  demonstrations  and  most  useful  results. 

But  there  are  many  who  deny  themselves  ab- 
solutely privileges  of  fatherhood  and  motherhood 
upon  grounds  which  are  not  only  selfish  or  in  any 
way  discreditable,  but  of  the  highest  and  most 
unselfish.  I  refer  to  that  small  but  rapidly  in- 


RELUCTANT  PARENTAGE  261 

creasing  class  who  refuse  to  bear  children  because 
they  believe  themselves,  rightly  or  wrongly,  likely 
to  transmit  physical  or  mental  defects.  This  at- 
titude is  one  of  the  highest  triumphs  of  biologic 
morality  and  racial  ethics,  and  is  entitled  not  merely 
to  our  profoundest  respect  and  warmest  encour- 
agement, but  to  our  deepest  sympathy.  Next  after 
the  deliberate  laying  down  of  his  own  life  for  his 
country  it  is  the  highest  and  hardest  sacrifice  of 
which  any  human  being  is  capable.  Each  instance 
of  this  sort  should  of  course  be  most  carefully  and 
thoroughly  studied  by  at  least  four  or  five  medical 
and  biological  experts  so  as  to  establish  most  firmly 
and  unquestionably  the  existence  of  such  a  defect 
in  the  blood  of  the  individual  and  the  probability 
of  its  transmission  to  offspring.  Not  only  so,  but  the 
precise  percentage  of  such  offspring  which  are  likely 
to  inherit  this  defect  should  be  worked  out  as  nearly 
as  possible.  For  it  must  be  remembered  that  the 
mere  ability  to  come  to  such  a  decision  as  this  in- 
dicates the  attainment  of  a  high  plane  and  the  pos- 
session of  both  mental  and  moral  qualities  which  it 
is  exceedingly  desirable  to  have  transmitted  to  the 
future  generation,  if  the  physical  handicap  be  not 
too  great. 

It  must  also  be  remembered  that,  according 
to  the  best  evidence  at  our  disposal  so  far,  defects 
of  all  sorts,  both  physical  and  bodily,  are,  as 
their  name  implies,  negative,  not  positive,  reces- 


262  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

sives,  not  dominants  in  the  Mendelian  scheme  ot 
heredity,  and  that  the  risks  of  their  reappearing 
in  future  generations  are  much  smaller  than  we  at 
one  time  supposed.  But,  putting  it  roughly,  the 
chances  are  at  least  five  to  one  that  they  will  be 
dominated  or  neutralized  by  the  vigorous,  healthy 
characters  in  the  ancestry,  especially  if  the  other 
parent  happens  to  be  born  both  sound  and  de- 
scended from  healthy  stock.  To  put  it  very  roughly : 
Bad  qualities  tend  to  breed  out  —  good  ones  to 
persist;  otherwise  evolution  would  be  a  progress 
downward  instead  of  upward.  The  chance  of 
three  healthy,  desirable  children  to  one  possible 
defective,  is  certainly  a  legitimate  risk  to  take, 
from  both  the  individual  and  racial  point  of  view. 
The  one  danger  of  this  race  conscience,  this  bio- 
logical scruple,  lies  in  the  fact  that  it  will  often  be 
active  in  the  most  desirable  elements  of  the  com- 
munity —  those  who  ought  on  racial  grounds  in 
every  way  to  reproduce  their  kind  —  while  it  is 
entirely  absent  in  those  who  ought  most  to  be  con- 
scious of  it  —  the  real  defective,  the  roue,  the 
drunkard  and  the  criminal.  The  remedy  for  this 
is  not  to  diminish  the  realm  of  this  scruple  but  to 
increase  it,  to  broaden  the  field  of  its  operation 
until  it  includes  not  merely  the  defective  parent, 
but  the  other  one,  usually  the  mother.  It  should  be 
regarded  as  an  outrage  against  herself,  and  a  crime 
against  the  State  for  any  mother  to  bear  children 


RELUCTANT  PARENTAGE  263 

to  a  father  whom  she  knows  to  be  either  mentally 
or  morally  unfit  to  be  a  father.  This  should  not 
only  be  publicly  avowed  by  the  community,  but 
should  be  enrolled  among  the  laws  of  the  State 
and  the  precepts  of  the  Church.  The  former  is 
slowly  recognizing  this,  as  our  increasing  roll  of 
divorces  testifies;  the  latter  is,  as  usual,  fighting  it 
tooth  and  nail.  The  moment  that  any  woman 
discovers  that  she  is  married  to  a  drunkard,  a 
libertine,  a  brute  or  a  criminal,  that  moment  she 
ought  to  be  set  free  from  him,  not  merely  for  her 
own  sake  and  for  that  of  the  children  already  born, 
but  still  more  for  the  sake  of  those  who  never  ought 
to  be  born.  When  this  has  once  been  accomplished, 
we  may  begin  to  look  for  a  real  and  effective  elim- 
ination of  the  unfit,  a  diminishing  of  crime  and 
pauperism  and  a  new  standard  of  purity  in  the 
marriage  relation  which  some  people  may  find  it 
difficult  to  live  up  to.  We  talk  of  the  menace  of 
the  criminal  class  —  biologically  considered,  there 
scarcely  is  a  criminal  class.  The  three  vengeful  furies 
of  race  purification  —  disease,  drink  and  dirt  —  do 
their  deadly  work  upon  the  criminal  so  effectively, 
saddle  him  with  such  a  low  birth  rate  and  enor- 
mous death  rate,  that  he  would  die  out  within 
three  generations  if  left  to  himself.  But  his  ranks 
are  recruited  so  steadily  year  after  year  by  the 
failures,  the  misfits,  the  black  sheep  of  the  classes 
above  him,  a  large  percentage  of  whom  are  children 


264  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

born  by  unwilling  mothers  to  more  or  less  respect- 
able, drunken,  reprobate,  or  brutal  husbands,  from 
whom  they  have  vainly  struggled  to  get  free. 

To  sum  up:  I  believe  that  the  evidence  shows 
that  race  suicide,  so  far  as  it  has  yet  gone,  has 
proved  an  almost  unmixed  blessing  instead  of  a 
curse;  that  the  race  can  never  again  return  to  the 
method  of  blind  and  wholesale  reproduction  without 
thought  of  the  future  or  calculation  of  the  ultimate 
result.  On  the  other  hand,  the  tendency  to  limit 
the  number  of  children  within  reasonable  limits  is 
likely  to  broaden  and  spread,  and  will  also  be  ration- 
alized and  purified.  No  class  or  group  in  the 
community  which  believes  itself  worthy  to  exist 
can  of  course  consider  any  proposal  to  limit  the  off- 
spring of  a  marriage  to  less  than  three,  or  such  num- 
ber as  may  be  necessary  to  secure  the  survival  of  that 
quota  of  adult  age,  so  that  the  second  generation 
may  be  at  least  a  trifle  more  numerous  than  the  first. 
Otherwise  it  would  of  course  either  become  extinct 
or  be  practically  overwhelmed  by  the  rest  of  the 
community. 

Biologic  morality,  while  deprecating  the  pro- 
duction of  children  who  are  either  likely  to  be 
born  unfit  or  become  so  from  lack  of  proper  sup- 
port and  adequate  training,  glorifies  and  exalts, 
as  both  the  highest  racial  duty  and  the  most  precious 
individual  privilege,  the  production  of  children  by 
those  who  are  both  personally  fit  to  bear  and  finan- 


RELUCTANT  PARENTAGE  265 

cially  competent  to  rear  children  who  will  be  of 
value  to  the  State.  There  is  no  achievement  better 
worth  living  for,  no  more  valuable  legacy  that  can 
be  left  to  the  future,  or  more  enduring  claim  to 
honourable  remembrance  than  a  family  of  well- 
born, well-reared  children.  And  this  feeling  is 
steadily  spreading  among  the  great  intelligent  upper 
stratum  of  the  middle  class,  the  real  aristocracy  of 
any  country.  The  pendulum  has  already  started 
on  its  return  swing  and  in  the  reasonably  and 
honestly  successful  classes  of  the  nation,  fair-sized 
families  are  beginning  to  be  looked  upon  as  desirable 
luxuries,  quite  as  well  worth  spending  money  upon 
as  automobiles  or  fine  horses  or  balls  and  dinners. 
We  are  beginning  to  take  a  pride  in  breeding  pedi- 
greed human  stock  instead  of  confining  ourselves 
to  horses  and  dogs  and  poultry.  Children  are 
coming  to  be  as  desirable  adornments  as  they  were 
in  the  days  of  the  Roman  matron.  At  the  same 
time,  there  is  a  growing  tendency  to  encourage  and 
promote  in  every  possible  way  the  marriage  at  a 
reasonably  early  age  of  young  people  who  are  par- 
ticularly desirable  as  future  ancestors,  to  use  a 
Hibernicism.  Some  day,  possibly,  we  may  become 
sufficiently  intelligent  to  endow  this  sort  of  matri- 
mony with  State  funds. 

The  general  progress  of  modern  civilization  has 
markedly  diminished  infant  mortality,  together  with 
all  other  death  rates.  How  far  have  the  well-meant 


266  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

experiments  of  philanthropy  assisted  in  this  and 
how  far  have  they  hindered?  One  of  its  first  and 
most  natural  attempts,  the  institutional  treatment 
of  children,  has  been  weighed  and  now  almost 
unanimously  found  wanting.  Babies  can  be  raised 
cheaply  by  wholesale,  but  they  are  apt  to  be  a  cheap 
machine-made  product,  without  individuality  or  initi- 
ative. No  place  like  home  for  growing  live  children  in, 
and  a  baby's  best  friend  is  its  mother,  or  failing  her, 
its  aunt,  or  older  sister.  The  community  will  save 
money  by  paying  them  to  take  care  of  it  instead  of 
endowing  foundling  hospitals  and  orphan  asylums. 

Another  practice  of  doubtful  value  has  been  that 
of  preaching  to  the  poor  to  be  content  with  their 
wages  and  with  that  station  to  which  it  has  pleased 
Providence  to  call  them,  instead  of  encouraging 
them  to  fight  for  higher  wages  and  a  fairer  share 
of  the  products  of  their  toil.  Life,  growth  and 
progress  are  all  wasteful  instead  of  economical. 
The  economical  nations  of  the  world  are  the  stag- 
nant ones.  The  chief  cause  of  infant  mortality  is 
poverty;  the  second  and  third  its  cousins,  ignorance 
and  dirt.  The  only  radical  cure  for  poverty  is 
higher  wages.  Philanthropy  has  not  addressed  itself 
positively  yet  to  the  practical  side  of  the  problem, 
raising  wages  and  shortening  hours;  the  poor  have 
been  left  to  fight  that  out  alone.  Poverty  is  not  a 
permanent  nor  a  necessary  state,  still  less  a  desirable 
one,  or  a  means  of  grace.  It  is  an  accident  —  a 


RELUCTANT  PARENTAGE  267 

disease  and  a  preventable  disease  at  that.  Every- 
thing that  we  do  on  the  positive  side  toward  pre- 
venting poverty  will  prevent  disease,  infant  mor- 
tality, dependency,  pauperism  and  crime.  From 
2O  to  40  per  cent,  of  the  large  infant  mortality  of 
English  factory  mothers  is  attributed  to  immaturity 
and  prematurity,  which  means  underfeeding,  over- 
work, or  over-breeding  of  the  mothers. 

Of  even  more  doubtful  value  is  the  plan  of  teach- 
ing the  poor  to  use  cheap  foods,  especially  for  their 
children,  to  make  the  little  that  they  have  to  go 
a  long  way.  The  little  is  made  to  go  a  long  way 
chiefly  by  diluting  it  with  water,  as  in  soups  in  soup 
kitchens,  or  with  starch  and  indigestible  vegetable 
fibre  and  husk,  as  in  cornmeal,  oatmeal,  bran  bread, 
mushes,  beans  and  coarse  vegetables.  We  would  not 
dream  of  living  on  these  things  ourselves,  they  are 
nearly  all  either  grossly  defective  in  proteins,  like 
cornmeal,  potatoes,  and  rice,  or  loaded  with  irritating 
and  indigestible  elements,  like  beans  and  peas  and 
oatmeal  and  nuts,  or  consist  chiefly  of  salts,  water 
and  vegetable  fibre  about  as  digestible  as  cocoanut 
matting,  like  the  green  vegetables  and  the  salads. 
A  cheap  food,  eight  times  out  of  ten,  is  cheap  be- 
cause it  is  deficient  in  nutritive  value,  or  lacks  one 
or  more  important  elements,  or  is  beginning  to  mould 
or  decay.  Children  must  have  expensive  food,  an 
abundance  of  proteins,  sugars  and  fats,  if  they  are  to 
grow  up  into  men  and  women  worth  while.  To  preach 


268  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

economy  in  feeding  infants,  or  their  mothers  while 
nursing  them,  is  to  preach  a  high  death  rate  and  stunt- 
ed survivors,  ready  to  become  paupers  and  criminals. 

Another  experiment  of  doubtful  value  is  that  of 
encouraging  mothers  to  go  on  working  up  to  and 
directly  after  child-birth  and  neglect  the  nursing 
of  their  own  children.  Anything  that  helps  to  make 
this  easier,  such  as  creches  and  day  nurseries  es- 
pecially such  as  receive  infants  at  ten  days  old, 
ought  to  balance  very  carefully  the  good  they  may 
do  against  the  harm  they  certainly  do.  The  child 
is  the  ward  of  the  State,  just  as  much  before  he  be- 
comes an  orphan  as  afterward.  One  of  the  great 
German  municipalities  some  years  ago  boldly  recog- 
nized this  fact  in  regard  to  illegitimate  children. 
They  were  placed  in  families  and  taken  care  of  by 
the  city  at  an  early  age,  with  the  ironic  result  that 
their  mortality  rate  dropped  to  half  that  of  the 
legitimate  children!  Why  can't  the  non-bastards 
of  the  exploited  classes  have  a  little  of  that  same 
fostering  care?  The  best  and  most  paying  job  that 
the  community  can  set  any  mother  at  is  that  of 
raising  her  own  child  to  the  highest  pitch  of  efficiency 
and  intelligence.  Some  day  we'll  have  sense  enough 
to  pay  her  to  do  it  and  feed  herself  well  in  the  pro- 
cess, though  the  ultimate  and  permanent  solution 
will  be  to  give  higher  wages  to  the  father. 

It  is  to  be  doubted  whether  the  habit  in  philan- 
thropic circles  of  encouraging  mothers  of  the  working 


RELUCTANT  PARENTAGE      269 

class  to  bear  large  families,  or  offering  prizes  or  ex- 
emptions from  taxes  for  all  children  above  a  certain 
number,  or  discouraging  any  deliberate  attempt  to 
limit  the  number  of  children  is  either  a  helpful  or  an 
intelligent  one.  A  high  birth  rate  practically  always 
means  a  high  death  rate  and  a  huge  infant  mor- 
tality. The  production  of  a  larger  number  of 
children  than  can  be  adequately  fed  and  properly 
trained  is  one  of  the  most  serious  complications 
of  the  problem  and  obstacles  to  social  progress.  The 
quality  of  children  reared  is  vastly  more  important 
than  the  quantity.  A  large  amount  of  human  raw 
material  is  required  for  purposes  of  selection,  but 
some  of  that  selection  had  better  be  made  before 
birth  instead  of  after.  Man  and  his  intelligence  are 
a  part  of  nature,  and  we  are  steadily  substituting 
an  intelligent  consideration  of  the  problem  to  bear 
or  not  to  bear  children,  for  the  old,  stupid,  cruel, 
wasteful  method  of  producing  as  many  children  as 
the  Fates  permitted,  and  leaving  Nature  to  weed  out 
the  less  fit  by  disease,  starvation,  and  cut-throat 
competition.  Infanticide  and  abortion  are  ruinous 
physically  as  well  as  criminal  morally,  but  are  they 
as  cruel  to  the  unfortunate  infants  concerned? 
An  intelligent  selection  of  those  individuals  who  shall 
or  who  shall  not  bear  children,  a  thoughtful  deter- 
mination not  to  bring  into  the  world  more  children 
than  we  are  reasonably  able  to  raise  and  equip 
adequately,  mark  the  path  of  future  progress. 


CHAPTER  XIII 

THE    AMERICAN    MOTHER 

UPON  most  points  our  conceit  is  robust  and 
colossal.  We  are  the  people,  and  knowl- 
edge shall  die  with  us.  Word  excavators 
inform  us  that  the  primitive  meaning  of  that  some- 
what vague  but  mouth-filling  term  which  those  of 
us  of  Germanic  blood  are  so  proud  to  apply  to  our- 
selves, "Teutonic,"  is  simply  the  people.  But 
we  are  delightfully  inconsistent,  in  our  vices  as  well 
as  our  virtues,  and  there  is  one  point  at  which  our 
comfortable  armour  of  conceit  gapes  widely  and 
crumbles  before  the  lightest  spear,  and  that  is  the 
breeding  of  the  rising  generation  and  the  training 
of  our  young.  That  alone  of  all  our  modern  ways 
of  doing  things  we  humbly  admit,  nay,  make  haste 
to  loudly  deplore,  is  far  inferior  to  the  practice  of 
our  mothers  and  fathers,  and  still  more  so  to  that 
of  our  grandfathers  and  grandmothers. 

It  is  not  necessary  that  any  one  should  reproach 
us  with  our  shortcomings  in  this  regard.  We  lift  up 
our  voices  of  our  own  accord  and  loudly  bewail  the 
disappearance  of  the  home,  the  weakening  of  family 
ties,  the  selfishness  of  parents,  and  the  irreverence 

270 


THE  AMERICAN  MOTHER  271 

of  the  young.  We  are  quite  sure  that  the  modern 
father  cares  very  much  more  for  his  business,  his 
club,  and  his  politics  than  his  parental  duties,  and 
that  the  modern  mother  is  much  more  deeply  ab- 
sorbed in  the  culture  of  her  mind,  in  the  expensive 
adornment  of  her  person  and  in  the  pursuit  of  social 
prestige,  than  she  is  in  the  care  of  her  children  and 
house. 

The  reasons  for  this  gratuitous  poor  opinion  of 
ourselves  and  our  generation  are  not  far  to  seek. 
Much  of  it  is  the  natural  and  inevitable  result  of 
the  dreadful  contrast  between  the  real  and  the  ideal, 
our  own  childhoods  as  we  so  clearly  remember  them, 
and  the  childhoods  of  our  fathers  and  mothers,  as 
they  have  so  often  described  them  to  us,  ideally 
happy  and  wholesome  and  perfect.  Our  parents 
were  so  supernatu rally  wise  and  devoted  and  we 
ourselves  so  impossibly  good  and  obedient,  that  it 
is  quite  out  of  the  question  to  expect  to  see  such 
another  little  heaven  below,  in  the  course  of  our 
existence  upon  this  mundane  sphere.  And,  of 
course,  we  don't,  for  the  simple  but  sufficient 
reason  that  two  thirds  of  what  we  are  pleased  to 
term  "recollections"  of  our  early  childhood  are 
as  pure  moonshine  and  fairy  tale  as  anything  be- 
tween the  covers  of  the  Green  Fairy  Book,  or  even 
in  the  pages  of  Sir  John  Mandeville,  or  Baron 
Munchausen.  The  stories  that  we  relate  at  re- 
unions, or  in  old  home  weeks,  or  pour  into  the  eager 


272  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

ears  of  our  innocent  offspring,  are  not  so  much 
romancings,  as  they  are,  in  the  language  of  Mr. 
Gilbert,  "  attempts  to  lend  an  air  of  artistic  veri- 
similitude and  interest  to  an  otherwise  bald  and 
unconvincing  narrative."  The  skeleton  of  them, 
so  to  speak,  is  approximately  true,  but  when  we 
clothe  them  with  flesh  and  blood,  and  the  glow  and 
colour  of  life,  the  resulting  legend  is  much  more 
nearly  a  rendition  of  what  should  have  happened 
to  us,  or  what  we  would  like  to  think  did  happen  to 
us,  than  an  actual  transcription  of  the  cold  and  colour- 
less facts.  After  we  have  told  them  half  a  dozen 
times,  with  successive  modifications  needed  to  pro- 
duce the  required  impressive  effect,  we  actually  come 
to  believe  them  ourselves,  and,  as  all  the  other  boys 
and  girls  of  long  ago  stand  by  us,  both  from  a  spirit 
of  true  comradeship  and  to  insure  our  backing  for 
their  flights  of  retrospective  imagination,  our  child- 
hood memories  become  a  thing  of  rosy  vapours 
and  purple  lights,  and  the  heights  that  we  could 
jump,  and  the  weights  we  could  lift,  the  number  and 
size  of  the  boys  we  licked,  and  the  beauty  and  wit 
of  our  little  sweethearts  of  long  ago,  something  to 
marvel  at  and  remember  with  delight. 

Naturally,  nothing  like  that  ever  happens  nowa- 
days in  the  cold  and  garish  light  of  day,  only  in  the 
light  that  never  was  on  sea  or  land  could  such  things 
have  been  seen.  Another  reason,  and  one  which 
comes  closely  home,  is  that  we  have  lost  the  blessed 


THE  AMERICAN  MOTHER  273 

and  happy  faith  of  childhood.  We  are  perfectly 
convinced,  and  rightly,  that  our  mother  was  the 
best  woman  in  the  world,  and  that  our  father  was 
wisdom  and  omniscience  itself,  and  could  lick  any 
other  man  in  town.  Do  we  for  a  moment  believe 
this,  can  we,  even  if  we  try,  of  the  fathers  and 
mothers  of  our  own  day  and  generation  whom  we  see 
about  us  in  the  shop  and  on  the  streets?  They're 
nothing  but  overgrown  children  who,  like  ourselves, 
have  in  some  absurd  and  utterly  illogical  manner, 
taken  it  into  their  heads  to  have  other  children  of 
their  own.  The  only  difference  that  we  can  see 
between  the  two  is  in  their  size  and  age.  Are 
they  anything  like  "Father"  or  "Mother?"  Perish 
the  thought!  We  are  in  something  the  same  at- 
titude as  the  big,  overgrown,  bashful  booby  of  a 
farmer's  boy  who  was  afraid  even  to  speak  to  a 
girl,  and  whose  father  one  day  finally  lost  patience 
and  scolded  him  roundly  for  not  looking  about  and 
finding  some  girl  to  marry.  "Why,"  he  said,  "at 
your  age  I  had  been  married  three  years  and  had  a 
house  and  farm  of  my  own."  "Well,  but,  dad," 
complained  the  boy,  "that  ain't  the  same  thing 
at  all.  You  only  had  to  marry  mother,  while  I've 
got  to  go  hunt  up  some  strange  girl  and  ask 
her  to  marry  me!"  The  preposterous  fathers  and 
mothers  of  our  own  day  and  generation  are,  and  will 
ever  remain  to  us,  simply  strange  girls  or  alto- 
gether too  familiar  boys,  playing  at  being  grown  up 


274  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

and  keeping  house.  Fathers  and  mothers  aren't 
what  they  used  to  be  when  we  were  young,  nor  chil- 
dren either. 

As  a  matter  of  fact  we  Were  as  ordinary,  trifling, 
lazy,  impudent  little  "varmints"  as  the  sun  ever 
shone  on,  or  ever  will.  But  could  you  make  any 
of  us  believe  it  now? 

This  is  the  chief,  I  had  almost  said  the  sole,  ground 
for  those  jeremiades  about  the  inefficiency  and  the 
selfishness  of  the  modern  mother,  and  the  indifference 
and  lack  of  sense  of  responsibility  of  the  twentieth 
century  father  which  we  hear  on  every  hand.  When- 
ever we  try  to  make  the  comparison  between  the 
new  family  life  and  the  old,  "fond  memory  brings 
the  light  of  other  days  around  us,"  and  we  see  the 
past  as  a  bright  rainbow  against  the  black  thunder- 
cloud of  the  present  and  of  the  future.  Yet  I  am 
convinced  that  our  forebodings  are  but  such  stuff 
as  dreams  are  made  of,  and  that  there  never  was  a 
time  when  motherhood  was  more  devoted  and 
unselfish,  and  fatherhood  more  anxious  to  give  and 
sacrifice  everything  to  make  the  rising  generation 
happy  and  successful  as  now,  and  there  certainly 
never  was  a  time  when  they  were  one  half  so  in- 
telligent or  one  quarter  so  well  equipped  for  their 
task. 

The  charges  that  are  most  commonly  brought 
against  the  modern  mother  in  general,  and  the 
American  mother  in  particular  as  the  most  flagrant 


THE  AMERICAN  MOTHER  275 

example  of  that  alleged  traitor  to  her  family  and  her 
race,  the  New  Woman,  are:  First,  that  she  is 
physically  incompetent  for  the  tasks  and  strains 
of  maternity;  second,  that  she  is  selfish  in  that  she 
prefers  her  own  comfort  and  good  looks  and  success 
in  life  to  either  the  number  or  the  health  of  her 
children;  third,  that  she  has  become  so  ambitious 
for  independence  and  for  public  recognition  that 
she  is  neglecting  the  duties  of  her  home.  Fourth, 
that  her  management  of  her  children  is  remarkably 
injudicious,  that  she  has  no  idea  of  discipline  and 
they  are  spoiled  and  pampered  and  allowed  to 
grow  up  without  any  respect  for  their  elders;  fiftlh 
that,  partly  by  the  weakness  of  her  own  nerves  and 
partly  by  the  unnatural  and  unwholesome  con- 
ditions of  food,  housing,  dress  and  social  habits, 
she  permits  her  children  to  grow  up  under,  she  is 
impairing  the  stamina  of  the  race  and  undermining 
its  future. 

Not  one  of  these  charges  will  stand  the  light  of 
inquiry,  and  most  of  them  go  up  in  smoke  under  the 
first  drop  of  the  acid  test  of  investigation  and  com- 
parison. To  take  the  gravest  and  most  fundamen- 
tal charge  first:  Is  the  American  mother  of  to-day 
physically  unfitted  for  her  vital  and  noble  task, 
the  bearing  and  rearing  of  children?  Nothing  could 
be  more  disastrous  than  her  failure  in  this  regard, 
and,  from  a  biologic  point  of  view,  no  triumph  or 
achievement  of  man,  however  brilliant  or  spec- 


276  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

tacular,  can  compare  in  dignity,  in  nobleness,  and 
in  value  to  the  race  with  the  bearing  of  children. 
The  home  is  the  real  centre  of  the  world,  round 
which  all  its  activities,  its  pomp,  and  pageantry 
revolve.  For  its  defence,  armies  march  forth  to  bat- 
tle; for  its  support,  smithies  ring,  and  looms  whirr, 
and  great  industries  grow  up,  and  trade  empires 
are  built.  For  its  protection  and  health,  courts  are 
established,  and  senates  meet,  and  churches  raise 
their  spires  toward  heaven.  The  chief  duty  of  man, 
in  the  biological  catechism,  is  to  grow  in  wisdom  and 
vigour,  in  honour,  in  kindness  and  happiness  up  to 
thirty  years  of  age,  after  that  to  enable  his  children 
so  to  grow.  This  is  his  only  excuse  for  remaining 
longer  on  the  planet  after  they  appear. 

The  real  and  supreme  test  of  any  civilization,  is 
the  quality  of  the  men  and  women  it  produces,  the 
character  of  the  children  that  it  breeds.  The  old 
German  proverb  goes  to  the  heart  of  the  matter: 
"The  best  of  everything  is  none  too  good  for  the 
child."  If  the  American  mother  is  indeed  under- 
mining her  physique  and  her  reproductive  vigour, 
she  is  guilty  of  high  treason  against  her  race  and 
against  the  community.  What  is  the  testimony  in 
support  of  this  grave  charge?  For  the  most  part, 
vehement  asseverations  full  of  sound  and  fury  signi- 
fying nothing.  Occasionally  the  picking  out  of  a 
few  isolated  instances,  from  which  it  is  argued  that 
the  process  is  universal.  The  more  carefully  they 


THE  AMERICAN  MOTHER  277 

are  examined,  the  more  completely  do  these  alle- 
gations and  alleged  exhibits  resolv-e  themselves  into 
varying  forms  of  the  ancient  delusion  that  the  golden 
days  were  the  good  old  times,  when  all  the  men  were 
brave  and  patriotic  and  honest,  and  all  the  women 
virtuous  and  devoted,  and  that  there  were  giants 
in  those  days  before  whom  the  creatures  of  these 
degenerate  times  are  little  better  than  pigmies. 

When  we  come  to  actual  data  and  measurements, 
and  get  down  to  the  hard  pan  of  actual  fact,  there 
is  a  surprising  agreement  pointing  in  exactly  the 
opposite  direction.  If  the  American  woman  of  to- 
day be  degenerate,  neurasthenic,  lacking  in  stamina 
and  constitution,  one  would  certainly  expect  her  to 
show  it  in  a  diminishing  stature,  a  lessened  chest  ex- 
pansion, a  lower  weight,  a  higher  death  rate,  and  in 
greater  liability  to  disease.  Upon  all  of  these  points, 
nine  tenths  of  the  statistics  available,  point  in  exactly 
the  opposite  direction.  Never  in  the  history  of  the 
human  race  has  there  been  such  a  marked  improve- 
ment in  height,  weight,  chest  girth,  longevity,  and 
morbidity  as  in  the  last  fifty  to  seventy-five  years, 
and  this  improvement  has  been  most  rapid  and 
striking  in  the  last  twenty-five  years,  just  the  very 
period  in  which  this  alleged  degeneracy  has  been 
most  rampant.  Accurate  and  reasonably  reliable 
statistics  in  regard  to  health  and  vital  conditions 
have  been  available  for  about  only  forty  years,  but 
in  that  time  the  general  death  rate  has  decreased 


278  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

nearly  forty  per  cent.,  the  average  length  of  life  has 
increased  thirtyper  cent.,  the  average  height  of  adults 
has  increased' nearly  an  inch,  and  the  average  weight 
between  ten  and  twelve  pounds.  These  statements 
are  based  upon  Board  of  Health  statistics  and  upon 
measurements  running  up  into  the  thousands,  and, 
in  some  cases,  hundreds  of  thousands,  made  upon 
soldiers,  college  students  —  the  average  height,  for 
instance,  of  the  Harvard  students  since  1861  has 
increased  nearly  an  inch,  and  the  chest  girth  and 
weight  in  proportion  —  upon  factory  operatives, 
and  upon  school-children.  The  objection  may,  of 
course,  be  raised  that  as,  in  the  nature  of  the  case, 
most  of  these  measurements  have  been  taken  upon 
men,  can  we  be  sure  that  the  same  process  is 
taking  place  in  women?  Fortunately  this  doubt 
can  be  laid  at  once,  for  vital  statistics  of  course 
include  impartially  both  men  and  women,  and  at 
almost  every  age,  with  the  single  exception  of  one 
decennium  in  the  period  of  child-bearing  in  women, 
the  lowering  of  the  morbidity  (percentage  of  illness), 
has  been  greater  in  women  than  in  men,  the  increase 
of  longevity  has  been  nearly  two  years  more,  and  the 
decrease  in  the  death  rate  has  been  greater.  In  the 
matter  of  height,  weight,  and  chest  girth,  such  smaller 
numbers  of  measurements  of  women  as  has  been 
made  show  also  in  the  same  direction.  Girls  in 
schools,  for  instance,  have  not  only  made  a  greater 
increase  and  improvement  in  height  and  weight  than 


THE  AMERICAN  MOTHER  279 

boys  but  have  actually  at  certain  ages  absolutely 
outstripped  them,  and  are  for  a  time  the  physical 
superiors  of  boys  of  their  own  age,  though,  of  course, 
usually  inferior  in  muscular  vigour.  Incidentally  it 
may  be  remarked  that  most  of  even  this  inferior 
muscular  difference  in  girls  is  due  to  our  antiquated 
and  senseless  training  in  the  matter  of  dress,  devel- 
opment and  ladylike  behaviour,  and  the  avoidance 
of  tomboyism.  Not  infrequently  nowadays,  where 
children  are  allowed  to  grow  up  unspoiled  and 
natural  or  what  is  usually  termed  "thoroughly 
spoiled,"  a  girl  will  become  the  head  of  the  gang  or 
the  bully  of  the  school. 

In  short,  there  never  was  a  time  in  the  recorded 
history  of  the  world  when  women  were  as  well 
abreast  of  men  physically  as  they  are  to-day.  What 
they  lack  in  mere  muscular  vigour  and  pugnacious 
achievement  they  fully  make  up  in  vegetative  vitality 
and  powers  of  passive  endurance  and  resistance. 
Women,  in  spite  of  the  outcry  which  their  sensitive 
nerves  often  make  in  advance,  bear  real  pain  and  pro- 
longed suffering  more  patiently  and  bravely  than  men 
do,  and  stand  them  better.  They  can  maintain  some 
sort  of  a  physical  equilibrium  upon  smaller  amounts 
of  food,  and  with  less  air  and  out-of-door  exercise 
than  men.  They  will  stand  for  half  a  lifetime  a 
monotonous  drudgery  of  unending  work  in  a  tread- 
mill called  home  that  would  drive  most  men  to  drink 
or  the  insane  asylum  within  five  years.  Contrary 


28o  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

to  popular  impression,  they  resist  most  diseases 
better  than  men  do,  not  merely  in  proportion  to 
their  size  and  muscular  strength,  but  absolutely 
and,  oddly  enough,  this  discrepancy  is  most  striking 
in  the  acute  infections,  such  as  tuberculosis,  pneu- 
monia, and  typhoid,  in  all  of  which  the  male  death 
rate  is  slightly,  but  distinctly,  higher  than  the  female. 
Between  five  and  ten  per  cent,  more  men  than  women 
die  of  tuberculosis,  for  instance.  Almost  the  only 
class  in  the  community  in  which  mortality  and 
morbidity  of  women  exceeds  that  of  men,  is  among 
farmers'  wives,  and  for  reasons  which  are  perfectly 
obvious  to  any  one  who  has  ever  lived  on  a  farm. 
Even  here  the  greater  death  and  disease  rate  shows 
only  in  those  two  ten-year  periods  when  many 
farmers'  wives  are  engaged  in  working  themselves 
to  death  and  bearing  too  many  children  at  one  and 
the  same  time.  It  used  to  be  a  common  saying  in 
the  Middle  West,  thirty  years  ago,  that  most  of  a 
certain  type  of  successful  farmers  were  living  with 
their  second  and  third  wives.  Now,  thank  heaven, 
that  type  of  woman  has  learned  either  to  assert  her 
rights  to  survive  and  share  in  the  prosperity  that 
she  has  built,  or  get  a  divorce,  and  then  we  lift  up 
our  hands  in  holy  horror  at  the  increasing  lack  of 
reverence  for  the  holy  sacrament  of  matrimony. 

It  hardly  needs  an  inspection  of  dry  vital  statistics 
and  musty  records  to  prove  that  the  American  woman 
is  not  deteriorating  physically,  but  distinctly  im^ 


THE  AMERICAN  MOTHER  281 

proving.  All  that  is  necessary  is  to  keep  our  eyes 
about  us.  How  often  will  you  meet  a  mother  whose 
grown,  or  even  sixteen-year-old  daughters  are 
shorter  than  she  is?  When  in  any  previous  age 
could  you  pick  out  in  any  community,  or  in  any 
assembly,  such  scores  of  tall,  graceful,  fresh-coloured, 
vigorous  young  Dianas  and  Bacchantes  capable  of 
taking  their  part  and  of  making  it  interesting  for 
the  average  man  with  the  raquet,  the  golf  club, 
the  paddle,  or  in  swimming,  cross-country  tramping, 
mountain  climbing,  and  dancing  all  night  long.  It 
is  a  common  saying  that  the  tall  girl  has  become 
fashionable,  and  therefore  she  has  appeared  in 
scores.  This  involves  a  high  compliment  to  the 
magic  power  of  woman  in  making  herself  anything 
that  she  chooses  to  be,  and  far  from  an  undeserved 
one.  Boast  as  we  may  of  belonging  to  the  Superior 
Sex,  in  our  heart  of  hearts  we  know  perfectly  well 
that  women  can  make  not  only  herself  but  us  about 
what  she  chooses.  We  have  almost  the  solid  and 
simple  faith  of  the  small  boy,  who,  while  gazing  with 
open-eyed  wonder  and  delight  on  the  picture  of  an 
elephant  standing  on  a  wine  glass,  was  pained  by  the 
suggestion  of  a  skeptical  elder  brother  that  it  was 
impossible  for  an  elephant  to  do  such  a  thing. 
Turning  a  reproachful  gaze  upon  the  scoffer,  he 
solemnly  declared:  "There  just  hain't  nuffin'  that 
a  effelunt  can't  do!" 

But  apart  from  the  exercise  of  such  mysterious 


282  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

and  occult  powers,  there  is  not  the  slightest  question 
that  the  enormous  improvement  —  in  food,  in  good 
ventilation  and  fresh  air,  in  exercises  and  in  play,  and 
in  rational  amusements,  and  more  healthful  and 
sensible  methods  of  life  generally  —  which  has  taken 
place  within  the  last  thirty  years  is  nowhere  more 
clearly  and  delightfully  shown  than  in  the  increas- 
ing vigour  and  intelligence  and  happiness  and  power 
of  initiative  of  the  girls  and  young  women  of  to-day. 
Nor  is  this  improvement  confined  simply  to  the 
tennis-playing  and  country-club  supporting  classes 
of  society  who  are  producing  the  athletic  type  of  girl 
in  such  increasing  numbers,  but  it  is  almost  equally 
true  of  the  great  middle  class  and  wage-earning  eight 
tenths  of  the  community,  as  is  shown  in  the  most 
unexpected  but  most  convincing  and  prosaic  fact, 
that  the  sizes  of  ready-made  clothing,  including 
shoes  and  gloves,  are  steadily  increasing  all  over  the 
United  States,  so  much  so  that  the  numbers  of 
twenty  years  ago  are  almost  a  size  too  small  for  girls 
of  a  corresponding  age,  or  for  adults,  to-day.  The 
more  distinctly  American  the  region,  in  the  best 
sense,  that  of  improved  food,  housing,  and  living 
conditions,  and  a  more  equable  diffusion  of  resources 
and  advances  throughout  the  community,  and  the 
more  striking  is  this  change,  as  shown  by  the  fact 
that  the  size  of  gloves  and  shirtwaists,  for  instance, 
which  suit  the  Boston  trade  are  too  small  in  Chicago 
or  Cleveland.  Any  one  who  will  walk  through  the 


THE  AMERICAN  MOTHER  283 

retail  districts  of  one  of  our  large  cities,  just  after 
the  closing  hour,  and  note  the  flood  of  tall,  well- 
grown,  happy-fa^ed  young  girls,  with  graceful 
carriage  and  fresh  colour,  that  sweeps  past  him  and 
can  continue  to  believe  that  American  womanhood 
is  degenerating  is  a  pessimist  whose  reason  is  closed 
to  the  evidence  of  his  senses. 

But  some  one  may  object,  does  this  necessarily 
prove  that  the  American  woman  of  to-day  is  as  well 
or  better  fitted  than  before  fci  her  maternal  duties  ? 
Is  it  not  possible  that  she  msy  have  increased,  so 
to  speak,  selfishly  in  general  physical  and  bodily 
vigour,  but  have  lost  ground  in  respect  to  her  power 
of  continuing  the  race  stream  unimpaired?  From 
a  biologic  point  of  view  it  is  hardly  possible  to 
conceive  of  such  an  anomalous  form  of  develop- 
ment, but  it  is  not  necessary  to  argue  the  matter  on 
a  priori  grounds,  as,  fortunately,  statistics  here  are 
as  definite  and  convincing  as  in  regard  to  h^.r  general 
physical  vigour.  The  American  baby  of  to-day 
has,  with  the  exception  of  certain  congested  areas, 
populated  almost  exclusively  by  recently  arrived 
foreign-born  immigrants,  the  lowest  death  rate,  the 
lowest  disease  rate,  and  the  highest  average  weight 
and  length  at  one  year  of  age  of  any  baby  in  the 
world.  The  American  school  child  of  to-day  is 
taller,  heavier,  and  of  greater  chest  girth  than  th^ 
children  of  any  European  nation,  and  this  supe 
riority  is  not  the  result  merely  of  a  sudden  blossom 


284  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

ing  out  in  a  better  environment  of  higher  wages,  and 
greater  opportunities  for  betterment,  but  is  cumu- 
lative, as  in  our  schools  children  of  foreign-born 
parents  are  taller  and  heavier  than  the  foreign-born 
children,  the  children  of  the  second  generation  of 
American  birth  are  slightly  taller  and  heavier  yet, 
while  the  list  in  physical  superiority  is  headed  by 
those  children  who  have  been  for  three  or  more 
generations  American. 

The  second  charge  against  the  American  mother  — 
that  she  prefers  her  own  comfort  and  welfare  to 
either  the  number  or  health  of  her  children,  in  other 
words,  she  is  becoming  unwilling  to  assume  the 
cares  and  responsibilities  of  motherhood  —  is  more 
difficult  to  meet  and  decide  upon.  In  support 
of  it  we  have  the  unquestioned  and  apparently 
damning  fact,  that  not  only  are  the  birth  rate  and 
the  marriage  rate  steadily  diminishing,  but  that 
the  number  of  children  born  per  family  has  under- 
gone a  distinct  and,  apparently,  alarming  decrease 
within  the  last  forty  years,  from  a  little  over  five 
to  about  three  and  a  half.  This  shrinkage  in  the 
size  of  a  family  being  most  marked  in  the  so- 
called  higher  and  more  intelligent  classes  in  the 
community.  But  there  are  two  important  side 
lights  upon  this  statement,  one  of  which  is  that  this 
decline  in  the  birth  rate  and  shrinkage  in  the  size 
of  the  family  is  by  no  means  confined  to  America, 
but  is  an  absolutely  world-wide  phenomenon  among 


THE  AMERICAN  MOTHER  285 

all  civilized  nations  and,  strangely  enough,  at  first 
sight  most  striking  among  those  who  are  forcing  to 
the  front  most  rapidly,  or  already  leading  the  van  of 
civilization.  A  further  paradox  appears  in  that, 
with  the  single  exception  of  France,  it  is  precisely 
those  nations  whose  birth  rate  and  number  in  each 
family  are  declining  most  rapidly  that  are  increas- 
ing most  rapidly  in  population.  In  other  words, 
the  phenomenon  of  the  declining  birth  rate  is  a 
normal  and  natural  accompaniment  of  progress, 
and  the  danger  usually  apprehended  from  it  is 
almost  purely  imaginary,  for  the  simple  reason 
that  it  is  everywhere,  again  with  the  exception  of 
France,  accompanied  by  an  even  greater  decrease 
in  the  death  rate,  so  that  the  net  result  upon  popu- 
lation is  one  of  gain  instead  of  loss. 

It  stands  to  reason  that  a  nation  like  India,  with 
a  death  rate  of  over  thirty  per  thousand  and  an 
average  lifetime  of  barely  twenty-two  years,  needs, 
to  hold  its  own,  double  the  birth  rate  and  average  size 
of  family  of  a  nation  like  the  United  States,  with  an 
average  longevity  of  forty-three  and  a  death  rate 
of  seventeen  per  thousand.  It  is  an  unbroken  rule 
throughout  the  animal  kingdom  that  the  higher  in 
the  scale  a  species  rises  the  slower  becomes  the  rate 
of  its  reproduction,  the  longer  its  period  of  im- 
maturity and  the  fewer  the  number  of  its  offspring. 
And  yet  not  a  single  instance  is  on  record  of  a 
superior  race  having  been  exterminated  by  a  lower, 


286  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

while  scores  of  cases  could  be  cited  where  a  small 
but  aggressive  superior  species  has  practically,  and 
even  absolutely,  exterminated  a  far  more  numerous 
and  inferior  one.  Just  so  in  human  society;  it  has 
always  been  the  classes  that  have  played  upon  and 
exploited  the  masses,  never  vice  versa. 

The  whole  question  of  success  to-day,  both 
national  and  individual,  is  a  matter  not  of  quantity 
but  of  quality.  This  the  American  mother  and 
father,  on  account  of  their  superior  intelligence,  are 
more  clearly  and  definitely  recognizing  than  those 
of  any  other  nation  to-day,  with  the  exception  of 
France,  and  as  a  consequence  the  number  of  children 
allowed  to  be  born  has  been  deliberately  kept  down 
to  the  number  that  could  be  most  effectively  and 
intelligently  nurtured,  trained  and  equipped  to  the 
highest  possible  pitch  for  the  struggle  of  existence. 
That  much  harm  has  been  done,  and  serious  damage 
to  health  and  life  incurred,  by  attempts  to  limit  the 
number  of  children  by  abnormal  and  unwholesome 
means  is,  of  course,  regrettably  true,  but  this  has 
been  a  comparatively  small  matter  compared  with 
the  benefits  to  both  children  and  parents  resulting 
from  the  process,  and  the  general  principle  under- 
lying it  is  sound,  both  from  a  biologic  and  economic 
and  ethical  point  of  view. 

As  we  have  seen  the  limitation  of  the  number  of 
children  is  no  new  thing,  or  special  vice  of  civiliza- 
tion. One  tribe  of  our  North  American  Indians,  for 


THE  AMERICAN  MOTHER  287 

instance,  has  six  different  forms  of  poisonous  plants 
or  roots  which  they  use  for  the  purpose  of  producing 
abortions.  The  Australian  blacks,  who  have  prob- 
ably one  of  the  lowest  grades  of  social  organization 
and  civilization  that  have  ever  been  studied,  have 
incredibly  elaborate  and  painful  methods  of  reaching 
the  same  end,  which  have  grown  into  the  dignity  of 
a  religious  rite.  Nor  is  there  any  more  basis  for  the 
kindred  delusion,  that  in  primitive  times  the  re- 
productive process  was  as  simple  and  natural  and 
free  from  danger  as  any  of  the  vegetative  processes  of 
nature.  The  death  rate  in  childbirth  of  the  savage 
and  barbaric  nations  is  higher  than  that  in  any 
civilized  race,  and  all  medical  missionaries  and 
government  surgeons  who  have  had  opportunity 
to  care  for  the  women  of  savage  tribes  are  unanimous 
in  testifying  that  all  the  accidents  and  injurious 
after  effects  of  the  process,  which  are  supposed  to 
be  peculiarly  the  penalty  of  the  feebler  physique  and 
more  sensitive  nervous  organization  of  the  civilized 
mother,  are  just  as  common  and  disabling  in  the 
wigwam  and  the  kraal  as  they  are  in  the  tenement 
and  the  palace.  In  fact  the  ease  and  safety  with 
which  the  savage  mother  passes  through  the  perils 
of  maternity  are  purely  imaginary  and  of  a  piece 
with  the  rest  of  the  myths  about  the  Noble  Savage. 
It  is  like  the  ancient  delusion  that  the  rich  have 
more  diseases  than  the  poor,  simply  because  no  one 
has  ever  had  the  decency,  or  took  the  trouble,  to 


288  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

study  out  and  adequately  care  for  the  diseases  of 
the  latter.  Even  the  old  idea  that  women,  by 
civilization  and  education,  were  becoming  so  un- 
natural and  feeble  that  they  were  no  longer  able  to 
nourish  their  own  children  by  nature's  method, 
has  been  proved  to  be  almost  pure  delusion,  due 
largely  to  the  perfection  of  modified  and  certified 
milks,  and  to  the  misleading  and  blatant  adver- 
tisements on  every  bill  board  and  magazine  cover  of 
the  different  kinds  of  infant  foods  and  other  sub- 
stitutes for  the  real  thing,  all  of  which  should  be 
labelled  Baby  Poisons,  for  they  kill  and  stunt  at  least 
ten  times  as  many  children  as  they  save  or  help. 
In  France,  where  they  have  really  civilized  ideas  on 
such  matters,  they  have  a  law  making  it  a  mis- 
demeanour to  give  to  any  child  under  one  year  of 
age  any  form  of  solid  food,  or  any  solution  prepared 
from  solid  food,  without  the  advice  and  consent  of  a 
physician. 

Investigations  in  a  score  of  cities  on  both  sides  of 
the  Atlantic  show  that  the  average  mother  in  all 
ranks  of  life,  even  including  the  highest,  is  well 
able  to  care  for  her  own  children  in  from  eighty- 
five  to  ninety  per  cent,  of  all  cases. 

In  fine,  from  a  physical  point  of  view,  no  mother 
of  history  ever  was  better  equipped  for  her  task 
than  is  the  American  mother  of  to-day.  And  how 
much  this  means  for  the  welfare  of  the  future  gener- 
ation may  be  glimpsed  from  the  significant  fact  that 


THE  AMERICAN  MOTHER  289 

nowadays  in  our  best  and  most  modern  baby-saving 
stations  we  feed  not  the  children  but  the  mothers, 
and  save  fifty  per  cent,  more  children's  lives  than  we 
ever  did  by  the  most  elaborate  schemes  of  sterilizing, 
pasteurizing  or  modifying  cow's  milk.  What  the 
mother  is,  that  will  the  child  be,  not  only  physically, 
but,  to  an  extraordinary  degree,  mentally  and  mor- 
ally. It  is  not  so  much  what  you  do  for  your  children 
or  teach  them  that  counts  as  what  you  are.  It  is 
far  more  dramatic  for  a  mother  to  die  for  her  children 
than  to  live  for  them;  but  it  is  not  half  so  good  for 
the  children,  and  maternal  self-sacrifice  should  be  bal- 
anced by  a  good  wholesome  share  of  intelligent  self- 
ishness in  order  to  develop  the  best  type  of  children. 
The  best  mother,  both  in  the  beginning  and  in  the 
long  run,  is  the  one  who  takes  the  best  care  of  her 
own  health,  of  her  good  looks,  and  keeps  up  an  in- 
telligent interest  in  life,  so  that  she  may  remain 
the  delightful  chum  and  the  valued  adviser  of  her 
children  all  their  lives  long. 

Looked  at  from  this  point  of  view  the  third 
charge  against  the  American  mother,  that  her  am- 
bition for  independence  and  public  recognition  is 
causing  her  to  neglect  the  duties  of  her  home,  rings 
as  empty  as  any  of  the  others.  Although  the  move- 
ment has  naturally,  here  and  there,  run  into 
bizarre  and  childish  extremes,  the  main  impulse 
underlying  it  is  the  fact  that  woman  is  outgrowing 
her  ancient  status,  which  was  frankly  that  of  slave 


29o  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

and  house  servant  for  life,  and  beginning  to  assert 
her  own  individuality  to  the  end  that  she  may  im- 
press that  individuality  upon  her  children  and 
become  their  guide  and  protector  not  merely  in  the 
nursery  stage  and  within  the  limits  of  the  picket 
fence  around  the  home  lot  but  also  during  the  much 
more  critical  and  dangerous  period  of  adolescence, 
girlhood  and  young  manhood. 

The  increasing  participation  of  women  in  business 
affairs  is  at  bottom  an  attempt  to  make  the  street, 
the  mill,  the  counting  house  and  the  store  as  clean, 
as  healthful  and  as  wholesome  environments  for 
boys  and  girls,  and  incidentally  for  women  and 
men  as  well,  as  the  home  now  is,  and  I  can  hardly 
conceive  of  any  lover  of  his  kind  and  friend  of  helpful 
progress  failing  to  do  otherwise  than  sympathize 
with  them  heartily.  We  have,  to  a  disastrous  de- 
gree, forgotten  our  obligations  to  our  children  in 
our  attempts  to  build  up  industries,  to  carve  out 
fortunes,  to  conquer  the  forces  of  nature.  The  real 
end  and  aim  of  all  these  triumphs  is  the  child  himself 
as  the  emblem  of  the  future  of  the  race.  Until 
even  our  greatest  cities  are  wholesome,  happy  places 
for  children  to  grow  up  in,  our  civilization  will  be 
crippled,  abnormal,  and  a  failure  upon  one  of  its 
most  important  sides.  And  we  children  of  a  larger 
growth  need  this  intelligent,  humane  consideration 
and  will  profit  just  as  much  by  it  as  our  little 
ones  would.  The  club-joining,  committee-belonging, 


THE  AMERICAN  MOTHER  291 

movement-promoting  mother  of  to-day  is  simply 
endeavouring  to  organize  and  apply  the  greatest 
force  known  to  humanity,  the  one  great  civilizing 
power  —  cooperation  —  to  the  problem  of  extend- 
ing her  care,  and  the  care  of  humanity,  over  her 
children  from  the  first  ten  or  twelve  years  of  their 
lives  in  the  home  to  the  equally  important  ten  or 
twelve  years  when  they  are  beginning  to  get  their 
real  start  in  and  hold  upon  life.  If  any  of  the  re- 
quirements of  business,  the  sacred  rights  of  property, 
or  even  of  our  most  precious  and  antiquated  politi- 
cal institutions  and  traditions  are  in  the  way,  then 
so  much  the  worse  for  them;  if  they  conflict  with  the 
spirit  of  the  new  movement  they  ought  to  be  wiped 
out,  and  many  of  them  should  have  been  on  general 
principles  a  generation  or  more  ago. 

The  direct  result  in  woman  of  this  increasing 
interest  in  public  affairs  is  so  to  stimulate  her  in- 
telligence and  to  increase  her  breadth  of  view  as 
to  make  her  not  less  efficient  in  the  care  and  man- 
agement of  her  children  and  her  house  but  far  more 
so.  If  there  be  any  problem  in  the  world  which  is 
in  urgent  need  of  the  application  of  a  little  twentieth 
century  intelligence  and  point  of  view  to  it  it  is 
the  one  of  keeping  house.  In  point  of  planning,  of 
organization,  of  labour-saving  devices,  yes,  even  of 
sanitation,  it  is  fifty  years  behind  any  other  of  the 
great  productive  industries  of  the  day.  The  best  we 
can  do  to  remedy  the  situation  is  to  let  the  women 


292  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

engaged  in  it  get  out  of  it  long  enough  and  far 
enough  so  that  they  can  get  a  good  view  of  it  from 
the  outside,  instead  of  leaving  them  swimming  round, 
and  round,  and  round  in  it,  like  gold-fish  in  a  bowl, 
three  hundred  and  sixty-five  days  in  a  year,  all  their 
lives  long.  That  sort  of  isolated,  perpetual  drown- 
ing in  petty  details  would  dull  the  most  brilliant 
intellect  and  kill  initiative  in  anybody. 

There  is  no  better  training  for  intelligent,  sanitary, 
efficient  housekeeping  and  home  making  than  a 
short  business  or  other  public  career  before  mar- 
riage. We  are  doing  everything  we  possibly  can  to 
increase  the  intelligence  and  efficiency  of  the  workers 
in  all  our  other  great  productive  industries  —  mills, 
and  factories,  and  shops,  and  schools  —  shortening 
the  hours,  raising  the  wages,  improving  sanitary 
conditions- — -and  yet  we  throw  up  our  hands  in  horror 
at  all  proposals  to  increase  the  intelligence  and  the 
individuality  of  the  workers  in  our  greatest,  most 
vital,  and  most  profoundly  important  productive 
industry,  for  fear  it  will  make  them  less  efficient. 
The  woman  who  has  broadened  her  intelligence, 
increased  the  horizon  of  both  her  knowledge  and  her 
sympathy,  developed  her  individuality,  her  judgment 
and  her  self-respect,  by  that  most  wholesome  and 
profitable  form  of  all  educations,  earning  her  own 
living,  and  making  a  success  of  it,  is  as  much  superior 
to  the  old-fashioned  rule  of  thumb,  wash-day, 
baking-day  way,  grandmother-used-to-do-it  type 


THE  AMERICAN  MOTHER  293 

of  housekeeper  as  a  steam  engine  is  to  the  stage 
coach.  This  is  not  a  mere  glittering  generality 
based  upon  a  priori  reasoning.  Ask  any  doctor 
of  twenty  years'  experience  in  any  American-born 
community  or  class,  and  he  will  tell  you  without 
hesitation,  nine  times  out  of  ten,  that  the  best 
mothers,  the  best  kept  and  most  healthy  homes,  and 
the  best  trained  and  fed  and  cared  for  children 
are  in  families  where  the  mother  has  either  earned 
her  own  living  as  a  teacher,  a  clerk,  a  shop  girl,  or 
intelligent  factory  operative,  or  has  had  either  the 
means  or  the  determination  to  specially  develop 
her  intelligence  and  her  individuality  by,  say  a 
college  course,  or  some  form  of  private  study  or 
interest,  or  active  work  in  philanthropic  and  the 
more  intelligent  social  movements.  Time  and  again 
I  have  heard  the  expression  from  my  colleagues: 
"Now  that's  a  family  it's  a  real  pleasure  to  practise 
medicine  in;  that  mother  is  almost  as  good  as  a 
trained  nurse,  and  better  than  a  good  many,  because 
she  knows  how  to  use  her  brains  in  an  emergency, 
instead  of  being  carried  off  her  feet  by  her  emotions, 
or  stampeded  by  her  feelings."  There  is  no  better 
mother  anywhere  on  earth,  in  my  private  opinion, 
from  a  very  extensive  experience  on  both  sides  of 
the  Atlantic,  none  within  twenty  per  cent,  as  good,  as 
the  intelligent,  self-respecting,  independent,  Amer- 
ican mother  of  to-day. 

It  is  true  that  her  independence,  her  self-respect, 


294  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

and  her  regard  for  the  interests  of  her  children  lead 
her  to  divorce  her  husband,  or  separate  from  a 
worthless  or  selfish  husband,  about  once  in  ten  or 
twelve  marriages;  but  this  is  only  what  European 
women  long  to  do,  if  they  but  dared,  and  there  are 
few  habits  which  have  had  a  more  improving  effect 
upon  the  wholesomeness  and  happiness  of  the 
atmosphere  in  the  modern  home  than  this.  So  long 
as  a  husband  practically  owns  his  wife  for  life,  un- 
less he  commits  and  is  convicted  of  a  gross  and  serious 
crime,  as  was  the  state  of  affairs  under  the  old 
regime,  and  is  yet  in  Europe,  so  long  will  there  be 
many,  many  homes  which,  instead  of  being  like  a 
little  heaven  below,  will  much  more  closely  resemble 
the  other  place  of  future  abode.  I  can  conceive  of 
nothing  which  has  a  more  wholesome  and  pleas- 
ing and  beneficial  effect  upon  both  the  character 
and  the  conduct  of  a  certain  type  of  husband  than 
the  knowledge  that  his  wife  is  financially  and  so- 
cially independent  of  him,  and  that  she  will  leave 
him  promptly  for  the  sake  of  her  children  if  his 
conduct  does  not  measure  up  to  her  standards  of 
right,  and  decency,  and  courtesy. 

It  is  this  same  fairer  and  broader  view  of  life  and 
its  problems  which  is  largely  responsible  for  that 
marked  change  in  the  attitude  of  the  American 
mother  and,  for  the  matter  of  that,  the  American 
father,  toward  their  children  which  is  so  loudly 
deplored  and  denounced  by  melancholy  moralists 


THE  AMERICAN  MOTHER  295 

and  disciplinarians  of  all  sorts  under  the  term  of 
spoiling.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  it  is  the  spoiled  child 
who  is  really  fitted  for  success  in  life.  He  knows 
what  he  wants  and  how  to  get  it.  He  has  a  high 
respect  for  himself  and  plenty  of  initiative.  It  won't 
do  him  a  particle  of  harm  to  butt  his  head  three  or 
four  times  against  the  wall  of  failure  in  getting  what 
he  wants.  He  will  strike  a  balance  between  what  he 
imagines  himself  to  be  and  what  he  really  is,  in  the 
stern  school  of  experience  quickly  enough.  He  has 
got  the  one  great  and  indispensable  qualification 
for  success,  individuality,  initiative,  willingness  to 
work  for  what  he  wants,  and  to  try  to  make  every- 
thing bend  to  his  own  wants.  He  can't  go  very 
far  outside  of  the  nursery  without  discovering  first 
that  he  must  recognize  the  limits  imposed  by  the 
strength  and  desires  of  others,  and  that  he  must 
make  treaties  with  them  in  some  way  to  secure  their 
cooperation  in  getting  what  he  wants  in  return 
for  not  getting  what  they  want.  This  is  the  basis 
of  what  we  are  pleased  to  term  morality  and  self- 
control.  The  only  way  and  place  a  child  will  learn 
it  is  by  actual  experience,  either  in  the  family  circle 
if  it  is  big  enough,  or  on  the  playground.  Preaching, 
teaching,  and  the  implanting  of  musty  ideals  have 
no  more  practical  effect  upon  him  than  the  classical 
water  on  a  duck's  back,  and  usually  chiefly  succeed 
in  disgusting  him  with  the  very  name  of  morality 
or  piety,  or  if  he  be  plastic  and  cowardly  enough, 


296  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

in  making  a  little  hypocrite  of  him  before  his 
time. 

The  day  of  reverence  in  the  family,  indeed  of  that 
feeling  by  any  human  being  for  any  other,  has  gone 
by.  Our  sense  of  humour  and  of  proportion  has 
destroyed  all  that.  One  of  our  great  popular 
preachers  voiced  the  ancient  ideal  in  vivid  terms 
the  other  day.  The  child,  he  said,  should  be  taught 
to  regard  its  father  as  God's  viceregent  upon  earth. 
How  many  of  us  American  parents,  I  wonder,  would 
have  the  face  to  stand  up  before  our  hopeful  offspring 
and  deliver  ourselves  of  such  a  preposterous  senti- 
ment and  keep  our  faces  straight  while  we  did 
it?  God's  viceregents  on  earth!  It  is  only  fair  to 
say  that  the  reverend  gentleman  was  an  English- 
man and  hence  not  to  blame  for  his  lack  of  a  sense 
of  humour.  John  Knox's  uncompromising  phrase 
addressed  to  King  James,  "God's  silly  vassal,"  would 
be  much  nearer  the  truth  as  we  know  ourselves. 
Who  and  what  are  we  that  we  should  undertake  to 
impose  our  laws  and  our  preferences  and  prejudices 
and  our  individualities  absolutely  upon  another,  even 
if  that  other  be  our  own  child  ?  The  best  way  to  teach 
him  to  respect  the  individuality,  the  rights  and  the 
feelings  of  others  is  to  teach  him  to  respect  his  own. 

It  is  astonishing  what  a  perfect  little  code  of 
natural,  wholesome  morality  an  intelligent,  kindly 
treated,  little  disciplined  and  unbossed  child  will 
develop  for  himself  before  he  is  ten  years  old.  All 


THE  AMERICAN  MOTHER  297 

we  need  to  do  as  parents  is  to  treat  our  children 
kindly,  feed,  clothe,  house,  and  play  them  well, 
and  if  there  be  anything  worthy  of  respect  or 
imitation  about  us  they  will  find  it  out  quickly 
enough.  If  there  is  not,  we  won't  make  them  be- 
lieve it  simply  by  telling  them  so,  no  matter  how 
often  we  repeat  it.  One  of  the  safest  and  most 
wholesome  of  corrective  mottoes  that  I  know  of,  for 
the  parent  considering  his  duties  toward  morals 
and  the  disciplinary  training  of  his  children,  is  that 
phrase  of  the  current  philosophy  of  the  street  to- 
day "Why  do  we  take  ourselves  so  —  seriously?" 
Most  of  the  atmosphere  of  scolding  and  reproach 
which  marred  the  old-fashioned  home,  the  ideal 
family  life  of  the  past,  was  due  to  the  exhausted 
nerves  and  tempers  of  mothers  weakened  and  soured 
by  overwork,  excessive  child-bearing  and  respon- 
sibility, lack  of  fresh  air  and  sunshine,  and  of 
intelligent  amusement  and  change  of  interests. 
Much  of  the  ancient  and  awful  discipline  of  respect 
exacted  for  parents,  of  absolute  prohibition  of 
any  "back  talk,"  and  of  the  attitude  represented 
by  such  mottoes  as  "Children  should  be  seen  and 
not  heard,"  was  due  to  the  desire  to  protect  pa- 
rental characters,  conduct,  and  motives  from  the 
merciless  and  humiliating  criticism  of  the  enfant 
terrible.  Part  to  the  fact  that  the  father  seldom 
returned  home  save  when  utterly  worn  out  and 
exhausted  with  toil  or  business  cares,  so  tired  that 


298  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

he  was  utterly  unfitted  for  anything  but  absolute 
rest,  and  the  noisy  play  and  gasconading  chatter  of 
the  children  rasped  his  poisoned  nerves  into  fury 
and  he  had  no  vitality  to  enter  into  their  plays 
and  interests.  That  form  of  training  for  children 
is  best  which  provides,  first,  the  most  intelligent, 
the  most  truthful,  and  most  kindly  parents,  and 
then  brings  their  children  into  the  most  intimate 
contact  with  them,  with  perfect  freedom  of  con- 
duct, and  mutual  self-respect  and  affection  on 
both  sides.  This  is  the  reason  why  the  American 
child,  in  spite  of  his  spoiling,  his  lack  of  reverence, 
and  indulgence  in  all  kinds  of  alleged  unwholesome 
foods,  and  his  precocious  social  development,  turns 
out  so  remarkably  well  in  the  vast  majority  of  cases. 
He  is  placed  on  the  same  sort  of  footing  in  his  home 
that  he  will  afterward  have  to  stand  on  in  life. 
The  petty  shifts  of  middle-aged,  feeble  minds  and 
of  mediocrity  for  enforcing  proper  respect  from  the 
young,  and  keeping  them  in  their  proper  places, 
which  encumber  and  cobweb  every  department  of 
life  and  vigour  of  human  activity  in  Europe,  have 
been  pretty  well  swept  away  here,  though  the  process 
has  not  gone  far  enough  yet.  We  hardly  know 
what  a  snub  or  a  "wigging"  or  a  taking-down,  or  a 
sitting-upon-hard  are  in  this  country  any  more.  It 
is  no  longer  considered  good  form  for  school  teachers, 
managers  and  foremen  of  businesses  and  shops, 
officials  in  the  public  service,  even  wealthy  uncles 


THE  AMERICAN  MOTHER  299 

and  crochety  aunts  and  grandparents  to  treat  with 
brusque  severity  and  gross  discourtesy  either  the 
children  committed  to  their  care,  or  the  most  up- 
start of  young  employees  or  inferiors.  Consequently 
our  children  have  no  blind  reverence  about  them, 
that  is  to  say,  no  fear  of  having,  metaphorically 
speaking,  their  knuckles  rapped  or  their  faces 
slapped  whenever  in  their  innocence  and  awkward- 
ness, or  even  what  we  are  pleased  to  term,  their 
impudence,  they  happen  to  blurt  out  something  that 
is  displeasing  to  a  short-tempered  or  conceited  elder 
or  superior.  Shyness  is  a  sign  of  fear,  and  intelli- 
gently trained  and  kindly  treated  children  should 
know  little  or  nothing  of  fear. 

Broadly  speaking,  to  spoil  a  child,  provided  of 
course  that  the  process  be  kept  within  reasonable 
limits,  is  to  put  him  on  his  own  basis  of  conduct, 
action,  and  morality  at  as  early  a  period  as  possible. 
To  discipline  a  child,  or  to  bring  him  up  strictly, 
is  to  impose  somebody  else's  standard  of  conduct 
and  propriety  upon  him,  and  the  natural  result  is  that 
distressing  phenomenon  known  as  the  sowing  of  wild 
oats.  The  minute  a  child  gets  his  liberty  he  pro- 
ceeds to  make  use  of  it,  and  the  experiments  he  makes 
with  his  new  hatchet  at  eighteen  or  twenty  may 
damage  him  for  life,  while  those  which  he  would  have 
made  in  the  nursery  would  have  resulted  in  nothing 
more  than  a  few  cut  ringers. 

The  spoiled  child  of  to-day  is  usually  by  twelve  or 


300  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

thirteen  years  of  age,  a  perfectly  companionable, 
live-withable  little  being,  whose  reason  can  be 
appealed  to,  whose  promises,  when  secured,  de- 
pended upon,  and  who  will  cooperate  with  you  in 
any  scheme  of  either  play  or  work  upon  an  effective 
and  rational  basis.  The  well-trained  and  thoroughly 
disciplined  youngster  of  fifty  years  ago,  at  the  same 
age,  was  often  a  perfect  little  devil  of  mischief  and 
brainless  adventuresomeness  the  moment  that  his 
parent's  or  teacher's  back  was  turned.  He  would 
promise  you  anything  and  then  do  exactly  as  he 
pleased  just  as  soon  as  he  got  out  of  sight,  and  if 
one  of  a  little  group  of  truants  lied  about  what  he 
had  been  doing,  all  the  rest  of  them  would  back  him 
up  and  regard  such  loyalty,  no  matter  what  its 
results,  as  the  highest  and  most  binding  type  of 
morality  that  they  knew.  Largely  as  the  result 
of  the  absolute  repression  with  which  he  had  been 
treated,  he  would  often  indulge  in  the  most  foolish, 
and  even  cruel  and  disgusting,  practices  in  private, 
just  to  assert  his  right  to  do  something  which  was 
forbidden,  something  of  his  own  accord,  which  we 
then  contemplated  with  uplifted  hands  as  another 
of  the  many  evidences  of  Original  Sin. 

Another  factor  in  the  success  of  the  American 
mother  is  the  extent  to  which  she  has  been  enabled, 
on  account  of  more  wholesome  and  primitive 
surroundings  of  American  life,  to  get  rid  of  that 
abominable  substitute  and  subterfuge  for  maternal 


THE  AMERICAN  MOTHER  301 

duties,  the  nursemaid.  There  have  been  few  in- 
fluences in  family  life  which  have  done  more  to 
lower  the  moral  standards  and  impair  the  refinement 
and  the  tastes  of  the  rising  generation  than  to 
commit  young  children  at  the  most  impressionable 
age  of  their  life  to  the  care  and  companionship 
of  ignorant,  stupid,  often  vulgar  and  indecent  nurse- 
maids and  other  feminine  field-hands  of  that  de- 
scription. There  can  be  no  hiring  of  substitutes  in 
this  war.  Every  mother  should  spend  at  least  one 
half  of  her  time,  and  every  father  at  least  one 
quarter  of  his,  in  the  direct  personal  care  and  edu- 
cation of  their  children.  Shirking  of  this  duty  is 
treason  to  the  race  and  to  one's  best  self.  Servants 
may  be  kindness  and  devotion  itself,  but  they're 
a  mighty  poor  substitute  for  real  fathers  and  mothers, 
especially  of  the  more  intelligent  class.  There  is 
a  flavour  about  the  child  brought  up  chiefly  in 
the  nursery  or  under  the  care  of  servants,  no 
matter  how  well  trained,  that  is  unmistakable.  A 
free-born  and  unspoiled  child  does  not  like  to  lie, 
but  he  quickly  learns  the  trick  of  fibbing  if  he  has 
much  to  do  with  servants,  who  are  still  practically 
in  the  slave  status,  and  whose  only  protection  lies 
in  the  slave  virtues  of  submission  and  deceit.  The 
healthy,  untrained  child  is  almost  absolutely  fearless. 
Leave  him  much  of  his  time  with  servants,  and  before 
he  is  five  years  old  he  is  desperately  afraid  of  the 
dark,  his  little  imagination  is  stocked  full  of  shapes 


302  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

of  terror  and  of  danger  of  things  that  will  catch  him 
out  of  dark  corners  if  he  isn't  a  good  boy,  of  giant 
cats  that  will  come  in  through  a  window  and  eat 
him  up  if  he  doesn't  go  to  sleep  at  once  when  his 
maid  wants  to  get  away  for  the  evening;  and  before 
he  is  ten  years  old  his  clean  little  mind  is  crammed 
with  all  the  vulgarity,  the  coarseness  and  indecency 
and  debasing  superstition  which  has  been  accumu- 
lating in  the  countryside  and  the  stable-yard  for 
the  last  five  hundred  years. 

The  more  closely  a  child  can  be  compelled  to  as- 
sociate with  his  parents,  within  reasonable  limits, 
the  better  it  is  for  both  —  though  it  will  be  a  little 
hard  on  the  child  sometimes.  If  you  want  your 
child  to  grow  up  civilized,  keep  him  in  the  twentieth 
century  while  he  is  growing  up,  instead  of  relegating 
him  to  the  dark  ages  of  the  nursery,  or  boarding 
school,  and  then  wondering  why  he  grows  up  such 
a  young  savage.  This  greater  amount  of  personal 
care  of  our  own  children  will,  it  is  true,  require  a 
considerable  recasting  of  our  stupid  and  antiquated 
hours  of  business  and  plans  of  work,  but  that  will  be 
found  to  be  one  of  its  chief  advantages.  Every 
working  day,  from  that  of  the  bricklayer  to  the"banker, 
should  be  so  planned  as  to  allow  time  not  merely 
for  proper  rest,  but  wholesome  recreation  and  social 
intercourse,  including  that  with  our  own  children 
and  families.  The  net  result  will  be,  as  shown  now 
by  thousands  of  experiments  all  with  the  same  result, 


THE  AMERICAN  MOTHER  303 

that  the  amount  of  work  done  in  the  seven  or  eight 
hours  of  labour,  will  be  twenty  to  forty  per  cent, 
greater  and  its  quality  improved  in  the  same  propor- 
tion. There  is  nothing  we  do  quite  so  stupidly  as  work. 

Another  curse  of  mediaevalism  which  the  Ameri- 
can mother  has  largely  escaped  is  the  boarding 
school.  This  institution  is  in  part  an  evasion  of 
parental  duties,  a  hiring  of  cheap  substitutes  instead 
of  fighting  the  battle  yourself,  and  in  part  a  survival 
of  the  old  Puritan,  priestly  distrust  of  nature,  the 
fear  lest  the  child's  mother  will  love  him  so  much  that 
she  will  not  discipline  him  and  harden  him  properly, 
a  sentiment  which  found  its  frankest  expression 
from  the  lips  of  the  headmaster  of  one  of  England's 
most  famous  boy  barracks:  "The  boy's  mother  is 
often  his  worst  enemy."  The  boarding  school 
for  boys  is,  in  fact,  very  largely  a  survival  of  that 
distrust  of  and  contempt  for  woman,  as  such, 
which  was  a  characteristic  of  the  early  Church  and 
of  the  Dark  Ages. 

The  institution  had  a  certain  amount  of  rational 
basis  in  the  days  when  reading  and  writing  were 
rare  and  wonderful  accomplishments,  and  when 
families  of  education  and  refinement  were  scat- 
tered about,  singly  or  in  twos  and  threes  at  long 
distances  from  each  other,  and  surrounded  largely 
by  a  mob  of  servants  or  illiterate  day  labourers.  But 
these  conditions  have  changed  radically  —  in  fact 
in  this  country,  fortunately,  almost  utterly  disap- 


3o4  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

peared.  And  I  can  conceive  to-day  of  no  atmos- 
phere half  so  wholesome  and  improving  for  any 
child  to  grow  up  in,  till  at  least  the  age  of  sixteen 
or  eighteen,  as  his  or  her  own  family,  or  any 
school  so  desirable  and  so  healthful  for  normal, 
sensible  growth,  both  mentally  and  morally,  as  the 
public  school  of  the  country,  village,  or  town  in 
which  he  happens  to  be  born.  All  the  graces  and 
accomplishments  and  social  airs  which  may  be 
required  are  but  leather  and  prunella,  which  can  be 
laid  upon  and  varnished  over  this  foundation 
of  health,  character,  and  brains  in  a  couple  of  years 
by  any  skilful  parlour  varnisher  and  deportment 
expert.  Though,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  most  children 
will  acquire  these  little  arts  and  graces  for  them- 
selves if  they  are  allowed  to  mingle  freely  with 
their  own  family  and  friends  upon  all  sorts  of  oc- 
casions, instead  of  being  deliberately  excluded  for 
fear  they  may  be  in  the  way  till  they  grow  awkward 
and  self-conscious  and  then  suddenly  launched  into 
society  with  great  fuss  and  ceremony,  and  formally 
permitted  to  "come  out"  of  the  state  of  unnatural 
rawness  and  clumsiness  into  which  they  should 
never  have  been  driven.  Most  children  if  kindly 
treated  and  placed  on  their  own  responsibility, 
and  encouraged  to  respect  themselves,  have  natur- 
ally good  manners. 

The  success  of  the  American  mother   is  in  part 
due  to  the  fact  that  she  has  a  greater  freedom  of 


THE  AMERICAN  MOTHER  305 

choice  in  selecting  the  father  of  her  children,  and 
in  deciding  whether  she  will  keep  him  or  not  if 
he  proves  unworthy,  and  to  the  further  fact  that 
she  is  putting  her  brains  into  her  business  of 
child-bearing,  child-rearing,  and  home-keeping,  and 
training  and  developing  her  powers  to  the  highest 
possible  degree  for  this  purpose.  The  one  point 
in  which  she  could  be  improved  is  in  regard  to  the 
direction  in  which  part  of  that  training  is  expended. 
Most  of  the  higher  education  of  women  is  a  cheap 
imitation  of  the  higher  education  of  men,  and  as 
this  is  still  a  survival  of  the  Middle  Ages,  the  result 
is  an  enormous  waste  of  time  and  energy  upon  dead 
languages,  pure  mathematics,  and  a  strange  mummy 
called  pure  literature,  with  all  the  life  frozen 
out  of  it.  However,  our  great  democratic  Middle 
West  universities  are  leading  the  way  now  to  a 
more  rational,  wholesome  standard,  and  when  the 
American  mother  is  as  thoroughly  trained  in  the 
knowledge  of  her  own  wonderful  body  and  that  of 
her  child,  and  their  needs,  in  her  knowledge  of  the 
chemistry  of  foods,  and  of  physics,  and  hygiene, 
of  ventilation  and  house  management  as  she  is  in 
literature  and  dead  languages  and  the  undying 
stupidities  and  formalities  of  formal  education, 
when  she  knows  more  of  the  effect  of  heredity  and 
environment  on  the  future  of  herself  and  her  chil- 
dren and  grandchildren  than  she  does  of  the  failures 
and  stupidities  and  blunders  of  the  past  under  the 


3o6  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

name  of  history,  then  the  millennium  will  really 
come,  and  we  won't  need  to  go  to  heaven  to  get  it. 
The  average  American  mother  of  the  day  being, 
fortunately,  from  our  fairer  and  more  equable 
distribution  of  wealth  and  resources,  neither  an 
overworked  drudge  nor  a  brainless  parasite,  is  able 
to  devote,  and  is  devoting,  more  of  her  time,  more 
of  her  thought,  and  more  of  her  society  to  her  chil- 
dren than  any  other  mother  in  the  civilized  world. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

THE  DELICATE  CHILD 

THOUGH  we  worship  principles  and  have  a 
profound  admiration  for  rules,  our  real 
interest  is  in  exceptions.  If  we  had  some 
way  of  foretelling  in  advance  exactly  what  was 
going  to  happen  half  of  us  would  commit  suicide 
out  of  sheer  boredom.  We  know  that  everything 
proceeds  along  the  remorseless  sequence  of  cause 
and  effect,  and  that  it  is  vanity  or  worse  to  expect 
grapes  of  thorns  or  figs  of  thistles;  but  we  can't 
help  hoping  that  logic  will  prove  a  liar  this  time, 
and  we  live  largely  in  the  hope  of  the  unexpected 
thing  happening.  Our  principles  and  our  hopes 
are  as  deliciously  inconsistent  as  the  Irishman 
who,  after  weighing  his  long-fatted  pig  at  market, 
regretfully  announced  that  "the  crather  didn't 
weigh  as  much  as  he  expected  —  an',  faith,  he 
niver  thought  it  would!" 

Two  and  two  we  know  make  four  —  but  perhaps 
some  day  they  will  make  four  and  a  half  or  even 
five;  and  this  may  be  the  time.  This  is  the  charm 
of  gambling:  that  somehow,  sometime,  the  good 
luck,  which  we  know  we  have  done  nothing  to 

3°7 


308  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

deserve  and  have  no  logical  right  to  expect,  will 
come  to  us.  Most  of  us  would  rather  make  a 
hundred  dollars  on  a  long  shot  or  a  lucky  throw 
than  a  thousand  in  the  ordinary  course  of  trade 
or  service  rendering,  not  so  much  because  we  object 
to  the  greasy  drudgery  of  labour  or  slow  monotony 
of  business,  but  chiefly  for  the  inherent  charm  of 
getting  money  "like  finding  it."  The  unexpected, 
the  exceptional,  has  a  peculiar  and  never-failing 
attraction  and  charm  for  us.  That 's  why  we  ta'ke 
such  an  apparently  morbid  and  abnormal  delight 
in  stories  of  murder  and  bloodshed  and  crime  — 
because  they  so  seldom  happen.  Most  of  us  will 
live  patiently  through  a  long  life  without  seeing  one 
really  soul-satisfying  and  dramatic  killing.  We 
get  so  desperately  sick  and  tired  of  the  dull  monotony 
of  respectability  and  morality  and  propriety  that 
we  become  as  ravenous  for  the  sensationa1.  and  the 
gruesome  as  colts  in  a  clover  pasture  are  for  salt. 
Like  the  angel  child,  Toddy,  we  croon  to  ourselves 
over  and  over  again,  with  gh'oulish  delight:  "And 
Bliaff's  head  was  bluggy  —  bluggy  as  ev'ryfink!" 
Absurd,  irrational  and,  to  the  moralist  and  prov- 
erb-maker, lamentable,  there  is  something  sound 
and  sane  at  the  bottom  of  this  instinct.  Nature, 
like  wisdom,  is  justified  of  her  children.  We  do 
well  to  be  keenly  interested  and  to  waste  much 
time  in  speculating  over  the  exceptional,  for  here 
is  the  seedbed  of  new  discoveries,  the  starting- 


THE  DELICATE  CHILD  309 

point  of  new  conquests.  Here  is  the  fault  in 
the  mountain  chain  that  lets  us  see  how  the  rest 
of  the  solid,  level  earth  is  built  and  planned;  here 
is  the  gash  in  the  smooth  and  unbroken  skin  of 
circumstances  that  exposes  to  view  nerves  and 
arteries  and  muscles  beneath;  here  is  the  crack  in 
the  dull  mask  of  familiarity  that  gives  us  a  glimpse 
of  volcanoes  behind  it.  It  is  the  study  of  the  ab- 
normal that  often  gives  our  first  clue  to  the  mystery 
of  the  normal.  All  our  knowledge  of  the  wonder- 
ful perfection  of  the  human  machine  began  with 
the  study  of  its  breakdowns.  Here  is  one 
reason  why  we  should  not  destroy  the  weaklings, 
or  be  in  too  great  haste  painlessly  to  eliminate  the 
unfit. 

Nowhere  is  our  study  of  and  interest  in  the 
exceptional  better  justified  than  in  that  wonderful 
little  bundle  of  explosive  complexities,  the  child. 
We  know,  of  course,  and  have  known  in  a  general 
way  for  centuries,  that  what  we  as  parents  ought 
most  to  desire,  and  as  teachers  to  be  interested  in, 
is  the  child  who  weighs  between  eight  and  ten 
pounds  at  birth;  who  doubles  his  weight  the  first 
year  and  sprouts  two  inches  farther  up  the  yard- 
stick every  successive  birthday;  who  begins  to 
walk  at  fifteen  or  sixteen  months,  and  to  talk  at 
eighteen  or  twenty;  who  is  of  just  the  right  size 
and  intelligence  to  be  dropped  into  the  hopper 
of  our  educational  mill  at  five  years  of  age  and 


3io  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

to  be  ground  along  through  the  successive  years 
with  the  rest  of  the  human  grist,  and  survive  the 
process  without  apparent  harm. 

Fortunately,  such  is  the  directive  power  of  hered- 
ity, somewhere  from  eighty-five  to  ninety-five  per 
cent,  of  each  year's  annual  crop  of  children  are  bom 
like  this  and  grow  like  this;  and  it  is  well  for  the  sta- 
bility and  prosperity  and  comfort  of  the  community 
that  it  is  so.  A  good,  rock-ribbed,  substantial 
foundation  of  honest  mediocrity,  of  brainless  in- 
dustriousness,  of  monotonously  uninteresting  sanity, 
even  of  wholesome  stupidity,  is  necessary  for  the 
continuation  of  the  race  and  of  civilization.  Our 
great  systems  of  education,  with  their  worship  of 
routine  and  lack  of  imagination,  have  decided  that, 
since  at  least  eighty-five  to  ninety-fiive  per  cent,  of 
children  are  like  that,  this  is  the  only  kind  of  chil- 
dren that  exists  for  practical  purposes,  the  only  kind 
they  need  bother  their  heads  about.  Hence  our 
educational  mill  is  built  upon  the  admirable  and 
ingenious  system  known  in  our  factories  as 
"standardization"  and  "interchangeable  parts," 
illustrated  in  most  striking  form  a  few  years  ago 
by  one  of  our  great  watch  companies.  They  poured 
out  into  a  tray  the  wheels,  pinions,  cases,  hands, 
and  so  on  of  five  thousand  watches,  shook  them 
up  together  thoroughly,  and  then  set  a  mechanic 
to  pick  out  of  the  tangled  heap  at  random  the  parts 
required  for  a  watch  and  put  them  together.  The 


THE  DELICATE  CHILD  311 

resulting  haphazard  watch  ran  perfectly  and  kept 
within  a  minute  a  day  of  accurate  time. 

According  to  the  rules  of  our  educational  sys- 
tem, every  child  at  a  given  age  is  exactly  like  every 
other  child  of  the  same  age  and  size  —  or  if  it  is 
not  it  should  be  made  so;  and  the  same  methods, 
measures  and  standards  are  to  be  applied  im- 
partially to  all.  The  system  acts  badly  enough 
upon  even  the  eighty-five  per  cent,  of  average  com- 
mon-place, normal  children;  but  when  it  comes 
to  the  exceptional  child  whether  the  exception- 
ally gifted  or  the  unusually  defective  then  the 
result  is  most  disastrous,  either  to  the  system 
or  to  the  child  and  sometimes  to  both. 

Usually  the  child  gets  the  worst  of  it,  and  for 
the  simple  and  significant  reason  suggested  by 
the  famous  Stephenson,  inventor  of  the  locomotive, 
who  when  appearing  before  a  Parliamentary  com- 
mittee for  permission  to  open  his  first  railroad, 
eleven  miles  in  length,  was  pompously  asked  by 
a  local  big-wig:  "But  what,  pray,  Mr.  Stephenson 
would  be  the  consequences  supposing  that  a  cow  got 
on  the  track?"  "Well,"  said  Stephenson  in  his 
Lancashire  brogue,  "it  would  be  soa  much  t'  worse 
for  t'  coo!" 

Mothers,  God  bless  them!  know  better  and 
have  always  known  better.  With  the  beautiful 
instinct  of  maternity  that,  though  we  sometimes 
deprecate  it  in  our  superior  way  as  irrational  and 


312  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

even  regrettable,  we  cannot  help  admiring,  it  is 
the  unusual  child  in  the  family  who  has  always 
come  in  for  the  greatest  dower  and  heritage  of 
affection  and  of  tender  care.  Whether  the  ex- 
ceptionalness  be  plus  or  minus,  so  to  speak,  the 
little  one  endowed  with  rare  and  special  gifts  or 
pitiably  deficient  in  some  of  his  senses  and  powers, 
the  result  has  been  ever  the  same  —  the  weakliest 
child  is  the  best  beloved  and  receives  the  warmest 
affection.  And  this  singular  sentiment,  which  has 
been  so  often  commented  on  and  even  stigmatized 
as  unjust  and  morbid,  is  now  found  to  be  abundantly 
justified.  First,  because  normal  children  will  to 
a  large  extent,  if  given  kindly  treatment  and  good 
surroundings,  grow  up  of  themselves  and  become 
pretty  much  what  they  are  born  to  be,  regardless 
of  punishments  and  scoldings  and  so-called  in- 
struction. Second,  because  many  of  these  ugly 
ducklings,  so  dear  to  the  mother's  heart,  will  turn 
out,  when  finally  they  have  reached  the  full  zenith 
of  their  powers,  which  may  take  longer  than  the 
shorter  flight  of  the  average  child,  birds  of  rarest 
plumage  or  brilliant  song. 

On  the  other  hand,  though  those  children  born 
normal  will  grow  and  develop  healthfully  and  nor- 
mally —  I  had  almost  said  inevitably  and  irre- 
pressibly  —  under  the  ordinary  favourable  en- 
vironment, those  who  are  born  abnormal  by 
defect  have  little  or  no  such  tendency.  Without 


THE  DELICATE  CHILD  313 

special  and  expert  care  and  attention  they  may 
remain  practically  as  childish  and  as  incapable  of 
caring  for  themselves  at  fifteen  as  at  five;  but, 
by  proper  special  training  and  care,  two  thirds  of 
them  may  be  caused  to  develop  fairly  normally 
up  to  the  fifteen-year  level;  which  means  that 
they  are  capable  of  supporting  and  caring  for 
themselves  and,  to  a  reasonable  degree,  of  enjoy- 
ing life. 

Don't  on  any  account  neglect  the  average  "com- 
mon or  garden"  child.  He  is  well  worth  all  the 
time  and  care  you  can  spend  on  him;  but  put  your 
ablest  intellects,  your  divinest  patiences,  at  work 
on  the  problem  of  the  exceptional  —  yes,  even  of 
the  abnormal  —  child;  for  among  those  brambles 
and  tares  you  will  reap  some  of  the  finest  and 
most  perfect  of  the  wheat.  Havelock  Ellis  for 
instance,  found  in  his  brilliant  Study  of  British 
Genius  that  no  less  than  fifteen  per  cent,  of  the 
great  men  of  English  history  were  recorded  by 
their  biographers  as  "of  notably  feeble  physical  con- 
stitution" in  childhood. 

It  is  when  we  find  ourselves  confronted  with  one 
of  these  problem  children,  one  of  these  frail,  quaint, 
dreamy,  hyper-sensitive  little  beings,  who  "lacks 
stamina,"  who  has  no  desire  to  eat  with  both  hands 
and  the  whole  surface  of  his  face  back  to  his  ears, 
and,  in  Choate's  quaint  phrase,  "has  no  constitution 
to  speak  of,  but  is  living  under  the  by-laws,"  that 


3i4  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

we  really  have  to  call  our  brains  into  play  and 
show  what  stuff  we  are  made  of. 

We  have  a  somewhat  curious  idea  of  what  con- 
stitutes strength  or  a  good  constitution  in  a  child. 
In  itself,  of  course,  the  strongest  and  sturdiest 
baby  is  a  tiny,  feeble,  puny  creature.  The  secret 
of  its  strength,  the  trick  of  its  success  in  life,  con- 
sists in  its  ability  to  absorb  energy  from  its  environ- 
ment and  turn  it  to  its  own  use.  A  baby  is  simply 
a  sponge  in  mannikin  form,  capable  of  sucking  up 
the  sun  power  of  the  universe  and  turning  it  into 
growth,  action  and  thought.  How  far  that  process 
of  suction  will  go,  how  complete  will  be  its  success, 
is  as  impossible  to  prophesy,  during  infancy  or 
early  childhood,  as  it  is  to  tell  what  kind  of  a  crop 
a  young  apple  tree  is  going  to  bear  from  inspecting 
it  when  it  is  eighteen  inches  high. 

A  great  many  so-called  delicate  children  are  so 
only  in  appearance  and  have  really  exceedingly 
good  and  enduring  constitutions,  but  they  have 
difficulty  in  getting  the  first  beginnings  of  this 
suction  process  properly  established.  That's  what 
maternal  love  was  invented  for  and  where  the  new 
doctor  comes  in.  We  used  to  have  the  idea,  even 
in  the  medical  profession,  that  children  were  born 
either  with  or  without  a  definite  something  known 
as  "a  good  constitution";  and  that,  if  they  did  not 
have  it  it  was  hardly  worth  while  trying  to  raise 
them.  Our  attitude  was  about  as  rational  as  that 


THE  DELICATE  CHILD  315 

of  the  dear  old  lady  of  ninety  who,  on  receiving 
the  announcement  of  the  death  of  her  eldest  son 
at  the  age  of  seventy-two,  ejaculated:  "Dear,  dear, 
dear!  I  always  told  Josiah  we  never  would  be 
able  to  raise  that  child." 

Many  and  many  a  delicate  child,  if  he  can  be 
steered  and  nursed  and  coaxed  through  the  stormy 
first  period  of  adjustment  to  his  environment, 
grows  up  into  a  vigorous,  able,  long-lived  man 
or  woman.  One  of  the  most  desirable  faculties 
in  catching  and  drinking  in  the  sun  power  is  quick, 
active  response  to  all  the  influences  that  come 
from  the  environment.  In  the  average  elastic, 
happy-go-lucky,  thick-skinned  youngster,  this  re- 
sponse is  just  keen  enough  to  serve  its  purpose 
and  never  becomes  overmasteringly  powerful;  but 
in  the  delicate  child  the  response  to  certain  kinds 
of  stimuli  is  so  intense,  so  vivid  and  overwhelming, 
that  it  throws  him  off  his  balance  and  prevents  his 
proper  reaction  to  other  messages.  He  is  so  fas- 
cinated by  books  and  make-believe  and  pictures 
that  he  forgets  to  eat.  His  memories  of  what  he 
has  seen  and  heard  are  so  vivid  and  overmastering 
that  he  cannot  get  to  sleep  at  night,  or  his  dreams 
rob  his  slumbers  of  their  proper  refreshment. 

Just  keep  that  young  dreamer  firmly  in  con- 
tact with  mother  earth  for  ten  or  fifteen  years  by 
playing  in  the  dirt  nine  hours  of  the  day,  eating 
for  three  and  sleeping  the  other  twelve;  use  all 


316  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

your  ingenuity  to  make  his  food  more  interesting 
to  him  than  his  books  and  pictures  —  and  out  of  the 
same  stuff  of  which  his  dreams  are  made  he  will 
build  great  buildings,  carve  out  a  fortune  for  him- 
self, paint  pictures  to  gladden  the  world,  and 
win  new  discoveries  in  science  or  inventions  in 
industry.  Many  a  so-called  delicate  child  is  deli- 
cate simply  because  he  needs  hatching,  not  merely 
for  the  customary  period,  but  from  nine  to  nineteen 
years  longer. 

There  are,  of  course  a  certain  number  of  abnor- 
mal children  who  —  poor  innocents  —  are  abnormal 
by  reason  of  some  form  of  definite  physical  or 
mental  defect;  but  they  are  happily  a  very  small 
minority.  The  best  and  most  careful  estimates 
now  find  barely  one  half  of  one  per  cent,  of  all 
children  in  such  state.  The  overwhelming  prob- 
ability is  that  the  delicate  or,  as  we  now  sometimes 
term  it  the  atypical  child  is  so  on  account  of  some 
lack  of  proper  adjustment,  either  delayed  or  pre- 
cocious, to  the  ordinary  environment;  and  our 
problem  as  parents,  physicians  and  teachers  is 
diligently  to  hunt  for  the  point  or  points  of  mal- 
adjustment and  correct  them.  The  more  ex- 
perience we  have,  the  more  the  wonder  grows 
at  the  cheering  and  admirable  results  that  may 
be  obtained  from  even  the  most  apparently  un- 
promising material  by  '  patient  intelligence  and 
unwearying  kindness. 


THE  DELICATE  CHILD  317 

The  delightful  difference  between  a  child  and 
a  machine  is  that,  the  moment  you  find  and  remove 
one  point  of  maladjustment,  you  start  an  upward  and 
improving  impulse  which  runs  through  the  whole 
circle  of  its  activities.  You  remove  adenoids,  for 
instance,  and  improve  the  child's  hearing;  thereby 
you  promptly  release  him  from  the  false  reproach 
of  stupidity,  or  even  disobedience,  because  he  can't 
hear  what's  said  to  him,  and  he  regains  his  place 
in  his  classes  —  his  self-respect.  He  is  no  longer 
kept  in  after  school  —  and  thus  gets  his  full  play- 
time; his  appetite  is  improved,  his  sleep  is  better 
and  he  is  started  toward  a  higher  level  all  along 
the  line.  Straighten  his  crooked  teeth  or  fill  the 
decaying  ones  and  you  improve  both  his  appetite 
and  his  digestion;  you  increase  his  weight,  increase 
his  vigour  and  power  of  attention  both  in  the 
schoolroom  and  outdoors;  increase  his  resisting 
power  to  the  colds  and  sore  throats  and  stomach 
troubles,  whose  germs  are  perpetually  wandering 
about  seeking  whom  they  may  devour  —  and  your 
ailing,  backward,  cold-catching  child  is  improved 
twenty-five  per  cent. 

Some  delicate  children  are  weakly  and  deficient 
in  vigour  on  account  of  the  sins,  voluntary  or 
involuntary,  of  their  parents.  If  the  mother  has 
been  underfed  or  overworked  during  that  wondrous 
sacred  period  of  the  creation  of  a  new  life,  when 
every  energy  and  every  power  that  she  possesses 


3i8  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

ought  to  be  bent  and  turned  solely  to  this  one 
great  end,  her  child  is  liable  to  be  born  weakly 
and  to  die,  within  the  first  few  months  or  years, 
of  either  what  we  politely  and  pompously  term 
"inanition"  or  "marasmus,"  both  of  which  really 
mean  that  the  child  was  starved  to  death  before 
it  was  born,  if  the  Hibernicism  be  pardoned. 

Nature  is  far  more  careful  of  the  new  life  than 
of  the  old.  If  there  is  any  nourishment  to  be  had 
the  baby  will  get  it  from  the  mother  and  grow  like 
a  parasite  within  her  body  at  her  expense;  but  she 
cannot  work  miracles  and,  in  spite  of  all  her  fa- 
voritism, from  one  third  to  two  fifths  of  the  deaths 
that  occur  during  the  first  year  of  life  among  the 
children  of  our  labouring  and  manufacturing  classes 
are  due  to  this  form  of  prenatal  starvation.  The  best 
way  to  feed  the  child,  not  merely  during  its  period  of 
prenatal  life  but  also  during  its  first  year  of  mundane 
existence,  is  through  the  mother.  An  effective 
way  of  preventing  one  class  —  and  not  a  small 
one  —  of  delicate  children  would  be  by  a  formal 
endowment  of  maternity,  securing  to  every  pros- 
pective mother,  in  whatever  rank  of  life  the  best 
and  most  abundant  of  food,  the  wholesomest  of 
surroundings  and  the  completest  of  rest;  and  no 
other  money  spent  by  the  State  would  pay  such  an 
abundant  return  on  the  investment. 

Another  cause  of  delicacy  in  childhood,  not  a 
very  common  one  but  sadly  far  from  rare,  is  the 


THE  DELICATE  CHILD  319 

Plague  of  the  First-born.  This  setting  of  the 
children's  teeth  on  edge  because  the  fathers  have 
eaten  sour  grapes  may  crop  up  in  every  grade 
of  society  and,  thanks  to  our  idiotic  and  ostrich-like 
policy  of  concealment  of  the  all-important  facts 
about  it,  in  homes  of  the  purest  morality  and  highest 
refinement;  in  fact,  it  is  the  peculiar  blight  of  royal 
families  and  aristocracies,  and  is  a  possibility  for 
which  we  should  always  be  on  the  sharpest  and 
keenest  lookout  from  the  earliest  week  of  life.  Not 
more  than  one  innocent  babe  in  two  hundred  is  born 
doomed  by  this  plague,  but  the  transformation  that 
is  wrought  by  a  few  grains  of  God's  second  greatest 
remedial  gift  to  man,  mercury,  is  little  short  of 
magical,  changing  the  snuffling,  pasty-faced,  ailing, 
wrinkled-skinned  baby  into  a  plump,  comfortable, 
pink-and-white  youngster  —  to  say  nothing  of 
preventing  him  from  growing  up  stunted,  blear- 
eyed,  broken-toothed,  with  the  arteries  and  ner- 
vous system  of  an  old,  old  man.  Any  baby 
with  a  reasonable  or  even  the  faintest  suggestion 
of  this  taint  should  be  given  the  benefit  of  the 
doubt  and  a  course  of  the  remedy,  no  matter  what 
the  social  and  moral  standing  of  either  or  both 
parents. 

It  is  a  mercifully  fortunate  coincidence  that  the 
only  common  disease  in  which  the  iniquities  of 
the  fathers  are  visited  directly  upon  the  children 
is  the  one  for  which  we  have  the  surest  specific 


320  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

cure.  Thanks  to  mercury,  even  the  infant  so 
tainted  has  a  fair  chance  to  "break  even." 

For  the  most  part,  in  dealing  with  the  delicate 
or  unusual  child,  the  bugaboo  of  heredity  need 
not  very  seriously  disturb  us.  Complex  and  won- 
drous and  conceited  as  we  are,  we  are  little  but 
carriers  for  the  germ  plasm,  lanterns  to  protect 
from  the  ruder  gusts  of  circumstance  the  torch  of 
the  life  of  the  race  within  us.  Very,  very  few 
acquired  characteristics  are  transmitted;  and  almost 
the  only  way  in  which  we  can  possibly  affect  the 
next  generation  is  either  to  starve  or  poison  by 
the  toxins  of  infectious  disease,  or  by  external 
poisons  like  alcohol  or  lead,  the  blood  which  nour- 
ishes the  germ  cells  within  our  bodies. 

If  you  have  avoided  chronic  starvation,  alcohol 
to  the  point  of  saturation,  and  the  race  plague, 
you  may  face  the  future  of  your  children  with  a 
conscience  fairly  clear  of  misgivings  as  to  any 
handicaps  they  may  have  inherited  from  you. 
So  unbroken  has  been  the  continuity  of  the  germ 
plasm,  so  little  affected  is  it  by  the  series  of  bodies, 
the  successive  temples  in  which  its  light  has  been 
shrined,  that  ninety  per  cent,  of  the  characteristics 
of  your  child  date  back  at  least  to  the  Norman 
conquest  or  the  wars  of  Charlemagne;  and  your 
personal  contribution  to  or  influence  upon  his  hered- 
ity is  probably  less  than  five  per  cent.,  which  is  a 
humiliating  but  perhaps  a  consoling  reflection. 


THE  DELICATE  CHILD  321 

The  few  hereditary  diseases  which  survive  — 
such  as  epilepsy,  certain  forms  of  insanity,  sick 
headache,  and  possibly  alcoholism  —  are  now  re- 
garded rather  as  unbalanced  or  defective  states 
of  certain  parts  of  the  nervous  system  that  render 
them  liable  to  break  down  or  to  react  unfavorably 
under  ordinary  strains,  but  are  eight  times  out  of  ten 
capable  of  being  trained  and  fed  into  normal  vigor 
and  resisting  power,  rather  than  as  specific  tenden- 
cies toward  the  development  of  any  special  form 
of  vice  or  defect.  Under  ordinary  surroundings, 
half  of  the  offspring  of  even  the  drunkard  or  the 
epileptic  will  probably  grow  up  normal,  unless  he 
has  mated  with  another  victim  of  his  own  defect. 
So  that,  in  the  overwhelming  majority  of  cases,  the 
future  of  your  child  lies  almost  absolutely  in  your 
own  hands,  with  odds  of  twenty  to  one  in  favour  of 
his  growing  up  normal  and  wholesome  and  vigorous, 
if  you  only  avoid  doing  anything  positively  injurious 
or  obstructive. 

Don't  worry  about  your  gout,  or  your  neuras- 
thenia, or  your  New  England  conscience,  or  your 
quick  temper;  your  child  will  probably  never  know 
there  is  such  a  thing  —  unless  you  give  him  too 
many  illustrations  and  examples. 

It  is  really  surprising  how  large  a  share  of  so- 
called  delicacy  and  backwardness  in  children  is 
due  to  a  perfectly  preventable  group  of  causes  — 
namely,  the  acute  infectious  diseases.  Exceedingly 


322  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

few  children,  for  instance,  are  born  deaf  or  dumb, 
or  with  defective  sight,  and  very  few  either  crippled 
or  deformed.  Ninety  per  cent,  of  these  conditions 
are  emphatically  acquired;  in  other  words,  a  cripple, 
a  blind  child,  a  hunchback,  a  deaf-mute,  is  nine 
times  out  of  ten  a  manufactured  product  and  it 
is  perfectly  possible  to  stop  this  branch  of  the 
manufacturing  industry. 

The  little  fevers  of  infancy,  the  diseases  of  child- 
hood, are  by  no  means  the  trifling  and  unimportant 
things  which  we  were  at  one  time  inclined  to  regard 
them.  Their  death-rate,  though  low,  totals  nearly 
fifty  thousand  deaths  a  year  in  the  United  States 
alone;  and,  though  this  is  bad  enough,  we  are 
becoming  more  and  more  convinced  that  their  most 
serious  effect  upon  the  race  is  the  scars  and  the 
marks  and  the  damages  that  they  leave  upon 
the  survivors.  Many  and  many  a  case  of  delicacy 
and  feebleness  and  lack  of  thrift  and  vigour  is 
due  to  the  mark  left  upon  the  little  sufferer's  kid- 
neys, or  heart,  or  liver,  or  nervous  system  by  an 
imperfect  recovery  from  an  attack  of  one  of  these 
trifling  disorders.  Eight  tenths  of  all  our  so- 
called  chronic  degenerations  of  the  kidneys,  heart, 
bloodvessels,  liver,  and  nervous  system  are  now 
attributed  chiefly  to  after  effects  of  one  of  these 
acute  infections,  either  in  infancy  or  childhood 
or  in  early  adult  life. 

Fortunately  one  simple  method  is  the  best  known 


THE  DELICATE  CHILD  323 

preventive  and  the  nearest  thing  to  a  certain  cure 
for  these  after  effects  and  "hangovers";  and  that 
is  complete  and  absolute  rest  during  the  period  of 
convalescence  and  until  full  recovery,  not  merely 
of  the  former  weight  but  of  normal  vigour  and 
bounce  and  elasticity,  has  occurred.  Keep  your 
child  at  home  from  school,  keep  him  from  en- 
gaging in  the  more  violent  competitive  plays, 
keep  him  out-of-doors,  and,  if  possible,  send  him 
to  the  country  for  four,  eight  or  twelve  weeks 
after  an  attack  of  measles,  of  scarlet  fever,  of 
diphtheria,  of  whooping-cough,  of  mumps  —  yes, 
even  of  tonsilitis  and  of  a  severe  cold,  which  is 
an  infection  like  the  others  and  probably  per- 
manently damages  as  many  kidneys,  nervous 
systems  and  hearts  as  any  one  of  them  —  and 
you  will  have  taken  a  long  step  toward  warding 
off  the  risk  of  a  childhood  of  invalidism  and  of  an 
early  decay  of  his  arteries  or  his  nervous  system. 
Give  Nature  all  the  time  she  wants  and  every 
possible  advantage  in  the  way  of  surroundings, 
so  that  she  can  make  a  complete  and  permanent 
cure,  and  you  will  have  wiped  out  one  of  the  com- 
monest causes  of  invaiidism  in  later  life. 

The  same  may  be  said  in  regard  to  the  preven- 
tion and  cure  of  most  forms  of  crippling  in  childhood ; 
in  fact,  one  of  the  most  cheering  results  of  modern 
medicine  is  the  extent  to  which,  even  in  the  slums 
of  our  largest  cities,  crippled,  hunchbacked,  club- 


324  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

footed,  bow-legged  children  have  almost  disappeared. 
If  medical  science  had  done  nothing  else  for  human- 
ity this  would  have  well  repaid  all  the  time  and 
labour  that  have  been  expended  upon  it.  It  prac- 
tically has  come  to  the  point  that  there  is  no  excuse 
for  a  child's  being  or  remaining  crippled  or  de- 
formed, save  in  a  few  of  the  rarest  and  severest 
congenital  defects  or  after  prolonged  and  desperate 
suppurating  disease  or  crushing  and  maiming 
accidents.  All  cases  of  clubfoot,  for  instance,  if 
taken  in  hand  promptly  and  intelligently,  may  be 
cured  so  that  the  child  has  a  thoroughly  useful  and 
in  most  cases  a  perfect  foot;  and  this,  too,  often 
without  even  needing  to  use  the  knife. 

Nine  tenths  of  all  cases  of  hunchback  are  due  to 
tuberculosis  of  the  bones  of  the  spinal  column. 
Eight  tenths  of  all  cases  of  hip-joint  disease  and  a 
large  share  of  all  crippling  inflammations  and 
abscesses  in  bones  and  joints  all  over  the  body  are 
due  to  the  same  cause.  Many  cases  of  wasting 
diarrhoea  —  particularly  those  with  a  protuberant 
abdomen  —  and  a  large  majority  of  suppurating 
glands,  or  "kernels,"  in  the  neck,  throat  and  arm- 
pit, are  due  to  either  tubercle  or  the  pus-forming 
germs  of  wound  infections,  besides  many  backward 
and  wasting  and  under-nourished  conditions  in 
children,  for  which  it  is  difficult  to  discover  any 
positive  cause. 

Wipe  out  the  great  white  plague   alone,   as  is 


THE  DELICATE  CHILD  325 

perfectly  practicable,  by  preventing  the  spread 
of  its  contagion  from  advanced  cases  to  others 
in  the  same  household  and  family  with  them; 
send  all  children  found  or  even  suspected  to  be 
affected  with  it  out  into  the  country  for  a  course 
in  Nature's  great  hospital,  the  open  air — and 
you  will  within  a  single  generation  have  wiped 
out  of  existence  all  this  pitiful  army  of  cripples 
and  hunchbacks  and  scarred  and  stunted  and 
wasted  children. 

When  we  further  remember  that  from  ten  to 
thirty  per  cent,  of  all  cases  of  blindness  are  due  to  one 
infectious  disease,  the  contagion  of  which  gets  into 
the  eyes  of  the  child  at  birth;  that  another  large 
share  of  the  inmates  of  our  blind  asylums,  and  a 
still  larger  of  those  in  schools  for  the  deaf  and 
dumb,  are  there  on  account  of  a  preventable  disease, 
cerebro-spinal  meningitis;  that  a  considerable  pro- 
portion of  the  lamings  and  paralyses  of  childhood 
are  due  to  another  preventable  infection  for  which 
science  is  just  now  beginning  to  find  a  cure,  infantile 
paralysis  —  it  can  be  seen  what  a  tremendous 
amount  of  torturing  disability  and  pitiful  handi- 
cappings  and  cripplings  of  innocent  children  is 
going  to  be  swept  out  of  existence  when  science, 
with  the  assistance  of  an  intelligent  public,  gets 
these  infectious  diseases  under  control.  That  day 
is  already  in  sight,  thanks  to  the  patient,  self- 
sacrificing,  devoted  labours  of  our  world  army 


326  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

of  laboratory  workers  —  the  real  working  priests 
or  lay  brothers  of  the  religion  of  the  future. 

Another  field  of  wondrous  promise  in  the  building 
up  of  weakly  and  delicate  children  is  only  just 
beginning  to  open  up  and  can  barely  be  touched 
upon  here  —  that  is,  the  succession  of  discoveries 
which  we  are  steadily  making  as  to  the  influence 
upon  growth  and  health  exercised  by  certain  struc- 
tures of  the  body  known  as  the  ductless  glands, 
from  the  fact  that  they  have  no  open  duct  or  dis- 
charge-tube emptying  into  any  of  the  body  cavities, 
but  pass  their  secretions  directly  into  the  blood- 
vessels which  surround  them.  One  of  the  best 
known  of  these  is  the  thyroid  gland,  which  has 
already  been  found  capable  of  transforming  a 
certain  form  of  dwarf  idiot,  known  as  a  cretin 
and  very  common  in  certain  mountainous  districts 
of  Europe  and  Asia,  into  a  fairly  intelligent,  well- 
grown,  self-supporting,  useful  and  happy  member 
of  society.  His  condition  is  due  to  a  disease  of 
the  thyroid  gland  which  destroys  its  function, 
and  may  be  overcome  by  feeding  the  unfortunate 
child  with  the  dried  extract  of  the  thyroid  gland 
of  a  sheep. 

Another  ductless  gland,  the  suprarenal  gland, 
is  just  beginning  to  be  understood  and  found  to 
have  a  marked  effect  upon  the  development  of  the 
heart  and  bloodvessels,  and  also  incidentally  of 
the  lungs  and  liver;  and,  in  properly  selected  cases, 


THE  DELICATE  CHILD  327 

it  acts  as  a  powerful  stimulus  to  development 
and  a  tonic  to  the  proper  action  of  these  important 
organs. 

Last,  and  least  understood  of  all,  is  a  tiny  little 
gland  at  the  base  and  centre  of  the  brain,  directly 
above  the  top  of  the  roof  of  the  mouth,  known 
as  the  pituitary  body,  whose  over-development 
is  found  to  produce  —  if  occurring  in  young  life  — 
giantism  or  abnormal  stature,  which  is,  nine  times 
out  of  ten,  a  diseased  condition  and  not  a  desirable 
state  at  all  —  or,  in  later  life,  a  singular  and  gro- 
tesque overgrowth  of  the  hands,  the  feet,  the  jaws 
and  the  arches  of  bone  over  the  eyes,  known  as 
acromegaly,  which  makes  the  unfortunate  victim 
look  like  a  caricature  of  his  former  self. 

The  pituitary  body  is  also  correspondingly  shrunk 
and  atrophied  in  a  large  class  of  dwarfs.  Though 
little  is  definitely  settled  in  regard  to  it  as  yet, 
the  pituitary  is  now  beginning  to  be  rated  as  a 
sort  of  growth-regulating  centre  for  the  entire 
body,  a  view  that  was  suggested  by  the  writer 
nearly  fifteen  years  ago.  Several  investigators  of 
high  repute  have  expressed  the  hope  that  we  shall 
be  able,  by  the  administration  of  its  extract,  to 
control  certain  abnormalities  of  growth  and  de- 
velopment, in  a  most  helpful  and  interesting  way. 

Far  the  most  frequent  trouble  of  the  delicate 
child  is  inability  to  adjust  himself  automatically 
to  average  or  ordinary  surroundings.  And  by  one 


328  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

of  those  unfortunate  vicious  circles  which  occa- 
sionally occur  in  our  mental  processes  we  are  too 
apt  to  think  that  because  the  symptoms 
of  this  maladjustment  are  nervous,  mental  or 
temperamental,  they  must  be  combated  by  mental, 
moral  or  disciplinary  measures.  Our  children 
literally  ask  bread  and  we  give  them  a  stone  — 
argument,  exhortation  and  "appeals  to  their  better 
nature"  —  when  what  they  really  need  is  half 
an  inch  of  butter  on  their  bread  and  an  hour's 
extra  sleep  in  the  morning.  The  less  we  treat 
the  mental  and  emotional  peculiarities  of  our 
children  by  mental  and  emotional  means  the  better 
success  we  shall  have  in  dealing  with  them. 

It  should  never  be  forgotten  that  childhood  is, 
above  all  things,  a  period  of  storage  of  surplus, 
of  charging  the  body  batteries  not  merely  for  the 
day  or  the  month  but  for  the  threescore  years 
and  ten  that  are  to  follow.  All  the  processes  of 
intake  are  and  ought  to  be  at  their  fullest  and 
highest  tide.  It  is  hardly  possible  to  induce  a 
healthy  child  to  take  too  much  sound,  rich,  nour- 
ishing food  or  too  much  sleep.  It  is  easily  possible 
to  let  him  undereat,  or  to  let  him  stay  awake  too 
long,  or  overwork,  or  overplay.  A  growing  child 
should  have  all  the  food,  all  the  rest  and  all  the 
sunshine  and  fresh  air  he  can  possibly  utilize  — 
and  then  some  more  to  grow  on  and  store  up  for 
future  use.  The  young  robin  in  the  nest  eats  its 


THE  DELICATE  CHILD  329 

own  weight  of  food  in  one  summer  day;  whenever 
its  beak  is  not  wide  agape  it  is  asleep  —  and  the 
human  nestling  is  strikingly  like  unto  it.  Even 
to  threescore  years  we  do  most  of  our  growing 
while  we  are  asleep;  and  are  either  eating  or  earning 
our  meal  tickets  most  of  the  time  that  we  are  awake. 

Of  all  the  parts  of  the  child's  body  which  are 
growing  —  not  only  for  the  present  but  for  the  future 
as  well  —  which  are  piling  up  capital  in  advance 
for  lifelong  use,  the  nervous  system  and  the  brain 
are  the  most  forehanded.  The  child's  brain  at 
birth  is  already  over  one  half  its  adult  size  and 
attains  eight  tenths  of  its  full  bulk  by  seven  years 
of  age.  The  only  important  way  in  which  you  can 
contribute  to  the  vigour  of  a  child's  brain  and  the 
stability  of  his  nervous  system  up  to  seven  years 
of  age  is  by  feeding  him;  and  the  most  important 
and  vital  way  of  developing  his  mind  for  the  next 
seven  years  is  by  giving  him  full  opportunity 
to  exercise  his  senses  and  his  muscles  in  play 
outdoors. 

What  his  ultimate  mental  stature  will  be  is, 
like  his  bodily,  Nature's  affair  —  not  ours.  Here 
is  where  much  of  our  trouble  with  the  delicate 
child  begins.  We  don't  trust  Nature.  We  have 
no  patience  with  the  slowness  with  which  she  is 
building  up  that  large  brain,  that  wondrously 
complex  and  sensitive  nervous  system  or  that 
vivid  temperament.  Because  the  child's  mind 


330  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

or  nervous  system  shows  already  signs  of  unusually 
quick  response  we  think  here  is  a  mind  worth 
cultivating  and  forcing,  and  proceed  to  increase 
the  already  abnormal  vigour  of  his  mental  vi- 
brations, without  noticing  that  we  are  at  the  same 
time  throwing  his  liver  and  digestion  and  muscles 
further  out  of  gear. 

We  are  perpetually  pulling  up  the  child's  nervous 
system  by  the  roots  to  see  if  it  is  growing  properly. 
We  do  everything  to  stimulate  just  that  part  of 
the  child's  nature  that  ought  to  be  wet-blanketed 
and  slowed  down.  The  nervous  system  is  abso- 
lute king  of  the  body,  in  the  sense  that  it  will  get 
the  best  of  everything  that  is  going;  and  there  is 
not  the  slightest  danger  of  overbuilding  the  body 
or  overpampering  the  appetite  or  overencouraging 
the  indolence  of  the  delicate  child  who  has  a  top- 
heavy  brain.  Everything  that  he  eats  will  turn 
to  brain. 

Our  ideas  of  what  we  can  do  directly  to  promote 
brain  growth  and  mental  development  are  almost 
as  absurd  as  the  theory  gravely  advanced  not  half 
a  century  ago  that  a  moderate  degree  of  hydro- 
cephalus  —  "water  on  the  brain"  —  in  early  child- 
hood was  of  advantage,  because  it  expanded  the 
bones  of  the  skull  and  gave  the  brain  room  to 
grow  —  the  only  basis  for  the  precious  theory 
being  that  the  heads  in  childhood  of  -a  certain 
number  of  exceptionally  able  and  brilliant  men 


THE  DELICATE  CHILD  331 

were  so  large,  on  account  of  their  precociously 
developed  brains,  as  to  appear  almost  hydroce- 
phalic. 

The  first  requisites,  then,  for  the  building  up  of 
the  delicate  child  are  an  abundance  of  food  and  an 
abundance  of  sleep,  and  I  hardly  know  which  of 
the  two  requirements  to  place  first.  There  is 
no  question  that  a  large  share  of  the  success  of 
our  modern  treatment  of  tuberculosis  is  due  to  the 
absolute  rest  insisted  upon  in  the  open  air.  In 
fact,  food,  open  air  and  rest  form  the  great  trinity 
of  factors  in  the  cure.  The  nearer  you  can  come 
to  inducing  a  child  to  spend  half  of  his  time  in 
sleep  up  to  ten  years  of  age,  the  better  that  child 
will  grow;  and  this  is  doubly  true  of  the  delicate 
child.  What  he  needs  above  all  things  is  time  for 
adjustment.  He  is  one  of  the  illustrations  of  Rous- 
seau's profound  though  erratic  wisdom,  when  the 
philosopher  declared  that,  in  education  and  growth, 
"//  est  le  temps  qu' on  perd  gu'on  gagne"  —  "It  is 
the  time  that  we  lose  which  we  gain."  Have  no 
fear  but  that  your  child  will  "arrive"  ninety-nine 
times  out  of  a  hundred;  give  him  all  the  time  he 
wants.  We  admit,  with  owl-like  approval,  that  we 
cannot  put  old  heads  on  young  shoulders;  and  yet 
that  is  precisely  what  two  thirds  of  our  mental 
and  moral  training  of  children  attempts.  The 
child's  sleep,  of  course,  should  always  be  in  the 
open  air  or  in  a  breeze  between  open  windows; 


332  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

and  he  should  get  at  least  five  hours    of    sunlight 
every  day,  when  this  is  available. 

The  same  general  principles  should  apply  in 
regard  to  his  feeding.  Don't  be  afraid  to  follow 
even  his  whims  and  his  cravings  —  in  the  beginning 
at  least  —  until  you  get  him  well  started  in  the 
habit  of  wanting  to  devour  things.  Indeed,  nine 
times  out  of  ten  these  whims  and  fancies  of  his  will 
be  sounder  than  what  has  been  shrewdly  termed 
"that  ponderous  folly  of  the  middle-aged  which 
we  call  mature  judgment."  The  larger  his  brain 
and  the  smaller  his  stomach,  so  to  speak,  the  more 
concentrated  will  be  the  food  that  he  demands. 
Many  delicate  children  have  a  positive  craving  for 
butter.  They  will  literally  plaster  it  on  their 
bread  and  eat,  if  allowed,  a  quarter  of  a  pound  a 
day;  this  the  old  regime  sternly  denied  them,  but 
offered  them  a  tablespoonful  a  day  of  cod-liver  oil 
or  olive  oil  as  a  substitute!  Let  them  have  all 
the  butter,  all  the  cream  and  all  the  roasted  almonds 
or  pecans  or  English  walnuts,  in  reason,  that  they 
want;  let  their  bread  be  simply  an  excuse  for  butter 
and  their  mush  for  cream  and  sugar  —  and  you  will 
have  started  them  on  the  first  slope  of  the  up- 
grade toward  balance  and  vigour.  Sugar  is  another 
real  food  and  meat  another;  and,  though  both  in 
excess  may  possibly  have  some  undesirable  after  ef- 
fects in  adults,  these  have  been  greatly  exaggerated; 
and  the  popular  belief  as  to  their  unwholesomeness 


THE  DELICATE  CHILD  333 

for  children  is  almost  pure  superstition  and  little 
more.  Our  habit  of  feeding  children  upon  plain 
foods  and  inexpensive  dishes  is  based  on  Puritanism 
and  stinginess,  equal  parts.  There  are  no  cheap 
foods  for  children. 

All  healthy,  growing  young  animals  ought  to 
have  an  outward  and  visible  surplus,  as  well  as 
an  internal  one,  in  the  shape  of  a  coating  of  fat. 
This  is  the  invariable  rule  in  the  animal  kingdom 
—  plumpness  and  roundness  and  comfortableness 
are  the  marks  of  growing  young  things  —  and  it 
has  comparatively  few  exceptions  in  our  own 
species.  Broadly  speaking,  the  child  that  is  not 
comfortably  plump  is  not  normal,  in  the  sense 
of  getting  all  his  possibilities  of  growth  and  develop- 
ment, and  needs  usually  to  have  more  meat,  fat 
and  sugar  in  his  diet,  and  more  sleep.  If  a  child 
gorges  himself  into  an  attack  of  indigestion  when 
turned  loose  on  candy  or  cakes  and  cream,  or  in 
the  jam  closet,  it  is  simply  a  sign  that  his  diet  has 
not  been  properly  balanced  and  his  abnormal 
craving  is  a  mark  of  sugar  starvation.  Balance  his 
diet  properly  with  plenty  of  sugar  and  sweet  things, 
and  he  may  be  trusted  with  an  open  candy  box 
and  the  key  of  the  jam  closet. 

If  you  once  succeed  in  making  your  delicate 
child  fat  and  plump,  and  know  how  to  keep  him 
so,  you  have  solved  three  fourths  of  your  problem; 
and  time  can  be  trusted  to  do  the  rest. 


334  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

Above  all  things,  avoid  stimulating,  or  indeed 
paying  any  attention  to  that  part  of  the  delicate 
child  that  is  already  overdeveloped  —  his  mind, 
his  nervous  system  and  his  emotions.  These  are 
the  very  last  children  in  the  world  who  ought  to 
be  subjected  to  appeals  to  their  better  nature, 
to  their  reason  and  to  their  sense  of  the  fear  of 
consequences,  or  of  pride,  or  rivalry.  Feed  them 
all  you  can  induce  them  to  eat,  turn  them  out  to 
play  in  the  dirt,  put  them  to  sleep  in  the  open  air, 
and  let  their  minds  and  their  consciences  and 
their  moral  natures  go  hang.  A  mind  of  some 
sort  and  a  morality  of  some  sort  are  just  as  essen- 
tial to  survival  as  a  body,  and  will  grow  just  as 
naturally  and  wholesomely  from  contact  with  en- 
vironment. Keep  children  healthy  and  happy,  set 
them  a  good  example,  answer  a  tenth  or  more  of 
their  questions;  and,  like  Little  Bopeep's  sheep, 
you  can  safely  leave  them  alone  —  and  they'll 
come  home  with  their  mental  and  moral  tails  be- 
hind them. 

With  the  exception  of  the  fraction  of  a  percen- 
tage, already  alluded  to,  who  are  born  mentally 
deficient  or  morally  defective,  ninety-nine  per  cent, 
of  all  perversities  or  queerness  or  little  vices  of 
children  are  things  that  they  have  either  picked  up 
from  example  or  been  driven  into  by  fear. 

Keep  fear  as  absolutely  as  possible  out  of  the 
environment  of  not  only  the  delicate  but  also 


THE  DELICATE  CHILD  335 

the  healthy  child.  For  the  first  seven  years  of 
his  life  in  this  age  of  peace  and  safety,  there  is  abso- 
lutely nothing  for  him  to  be  afraid  of  or  which 
the  fear  reflex  will  enable  him  to  avoid,  save  such 
crude  and  rare  dangers  as  falls  from  a  window, 
or  being  run  over  in  the  street,  or  setting  himself 
on  fire;  and  he  should  grow  up  as  nearly  as  possible 
without  knowing  the  name  of  fear.  There  are  no 
bogies  who  will  "git  him  ef  he  don't  watch  out." 
There  are  no  witches  or  demons,  or  things  that 
lurk  under  the  bed  or  in  dark  corners  —  there 
is  not  even  an  angry  God,  who  has  damned  him 
in  advance  and  whose  accusing  eye  is  relentlessly 
in  every  place;  and  it  is  little  short  of  criminal  to 
put  such  ideas  as  these  into  the  minds  of  children, 
especially  of  those  who  are  already  of  a  nervous 
or  emotional  type. 

It  is  not  only  wrong  but  shameful  to  tell  an 
innocent  child  that  some  little  mistake  he  may 
have  made,  or  petty  offence  he  has  committed 
against  the  laws  of  the  household,  is  wicked;  for, 
he  is  as  innocent  of  moral  ideas  as  a  kitten  and  should 
be  kept  so  as  long  as  possible.  Fear  and  the  sense 
of  wrongdoing,  and  that  moral  biliousness  —  con- 
viction of  sin  —  will  come  soon  enough;  but  let 
him  at  least  start  free  and  fearless  and  happy. 
Develop  his  sense  of  humour  and  repress  and  dis- 
courage abnormal  conscientiousness  of  every  sort. 
A  diet  even  of  Sunday  Supplements  will  be  whole- 


336  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

somer  for  the  sensitive  child  than  one  of  Sunday 
school  books  and  Bible  stories. 

One  point  of  considerable  practical  importance, 
which  often  has  to  be  considered  in  the  care  of 
the  delicate  or  difficult  child,  is  as  to  whether  he 
needs  a  change  of  treatment  or  of  scene  and  sur- 
roundings. Broadly  considered,  no  environment 
has  as  yet  been  invented  half  so  wholesome  for  a 
child  as  a  good  home.  Very  often,  too,  the  changes 
that  are  needed  to  make  that  home  ideal  are  changes 
in  the  personal  attitude  of  the  parents  or  other 
members  of  the  family,  which  would  be  as  whole- 
some and  improving  for  them  as  for  him.  Occa- 
sionally a  selfish  father  or  nervous  mother  is  the 
worst  possible  companion  for  the  child,  particularly 
because  they  both,  so  to  speak,  stick  out  at  the 
same  points  and  grate  upon  one  another  in  pro- 
portion. On  the  other  hand,  such  contact,  if  it 
can  be  kept  within  reasonable  limits  of  friction, 
is  the  best  possible  education  and  discipline  for  both 
of  them;  and  the  education  children  give  their 
parents  is  at  least  as  important  and  valuable  as 
that  which  parents  give  their  children. 

Petulantly  to  give  up  the  problem  and  cut  the 
Gordian  knot  by  sending  the  troublesome  boy 
or  nervous  girl  away  to  school  is  simply  cowardly 
shirking  and  evasion  of  our  sacred  duty  as  parents. 

On  the  other  hand,  there  is  also  the  possibility, 
as  Oliver  Wendell  Holmes  humorously  expressed 


THE  DELICATE  CHILD  337 

it,  of  "Smith  smithing  Smith  into  the  insane  asy- 
lum"; and  an  occasional  change  of  air  and  a  vacation 
from  one  another  are  excellent  things  for  the  mem- 
bers of  even  the  most  harmonious  of  families,  from 
grandparents  and  grandchildren  up  to  husbands 
and  wives. 

A  helpful  compromise  between  a  series  of  per- 
petual jarring  and  of  throwing  up  the  hands  and 
turning  the  youngster  over  completely  to  some 
professional  childfarmer  is  the  summer  camp,  or 
vacation  home,  for  both  boys  and  girls.  Here  the 
youngster  can  be  given  a  chance  actually  to  live 
and  put  into  practice  his  daydreams,  with  paddle 
and  moccasin  and  eagle  feathers,  and  become 
for  the  summer  a  healthy,  happy,  unworried  and 
brainless  young  animal.  He  can  also  be  brought 
wholesomely  and  naturally  into  contact  with  young- 
sters of  his  own  age,  closely  enough  to  rub  the 
corners  off  and  take  the  nonsense  out  of  him  — 
and  yet  under  sufficiently  kindly  and  intelligent 
supervision  to  prevent  the  outgrowth  of  those 
brutal  little  habits  and  disgusting  mummeries 
and  false  codes  of  morals  that  boys  of  a  certain 
age,  if  torn  out  of  their  natural  home  surroundings 
and  forced  to  herd  together  in  dormitories  and 
within  bounds,  are  almost  certain  to  develop. 
Then  we  say  that  these  results  of  our  absurd  and 
artificial  system  are  the  natural  tendencies  of  that 
dreadful  young  savage,  a  boy.  His  absence  is 


338  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

just  long  enough  to  develop  a  good,  healthy  attack 
of  homesickness  and  appreciation  of  his  privileges 
and  blessings  in  the  family  circle,  and  at  the  same 
time  to  give  opportunity  for  the  development  of 
a  similar  mellowing  process  in  the  mental  attitude 
of  the  members  of  his  family  at  home  toward  him. 
When  autumn  comes  he  will  be  glad  to  get  back 
and  they  will  be  glad  to  have  him  back;  and  both 
will  be  much  more  likely  to  do  their  best  to  get 
along  with  each  other  with  the  prospect  of  another 
pleasant  vacation  separation  next  year. 


CHAPTER   XV 

FICTION  AS  A  DIET 

TO  THE  serious-minded  the  value  of  fiction 
as  a  diet  would  seem  about  equivalent 
to  that  of  froth  as  food.  They  will  assure 
us  that  we  might  as  well  endeavour  to  grow  fat 
by  snuffing  up  the  east  wind,  like  the  Scriptural 
wild  ass  of  the  desert,  as  to  build  up  either  mental 
or  bodily  power  upon  a  diet  of  fiction.  But  some 
of  the  apparently  most  useless  things  in  the  world 
are  the  most  necessary  to  life.  We  cannot  eat 
froth  or  digest  the  air  that  its  bubbles  contain, 
but  nearly  half  the  bulk  of  our  most  important 
single  food,  bread,  the  Staff  of  Life,  is  composed 
of  it.  A  loaf  is  a  bubble  of  flour  froth  and  owes 
much  of  its  digestibility  and  wholesomeness  to  the 
spongy  porous  form  which  its  gas  content  gives  it. 
Plants  cannot  eat  air,  yet  one  of  the  principal 
aims  of  scientific  tillage  is  to  keep  the  soil  bed  well 
stirred  up  so  as  to  be  porous  and  full  of  air  down 
to  the  very  tips  of  the  roots  of  the  crop,  so  that 
chemical  and  bacterial  changes,  without  which  no 
plant  can  live,  can  take  place  freely. 

Food  for  the  fancy  may  neither  directly  strengthen 

339 


340  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

the  intellect  nor  enrich  the  memory,  but  neither 
of  the  latter  can  either  grow  or  keep  healthy  with- 
out it,  any  more  than  other  living  things  can  without 
the  sunshine  and  fresh  air  —  those  most  ethereal 
and  unsubstantial  of  things. 

It  is  often  the  trivial  things  that  really  matter. 
Man  is  emphatically  made  all  in  one  piece:  body, 
soul,  and  spirit,  will,  intellect,  and  imagination, 
and  if  you  starve  one  of  his  demands,  you  cheat 
all.  As  porridge  without  salt,  yes,  as  a  gun  without 
flint  or  percussion  cap,  would  be  life  without  im- 
agination. A  dwarfed  and  starved  imagination 
is  almost  as  bad  for  the  health  and  future  efficiency 
of  its  possessor  as  a  crooked  spine.  One  of  the 
gravest  obstacles  that  we  find  in  our  hygienic 
campaigns  is  the  difficulty  of  getting  people  to 
imagine  and  believe  in  the  possibility  of  some 
improvement  in  the  conditions  which  they  have 
been  accustomed  to,  and  in  the  habits  in  which 
they  have  been  bred.  The  causes  of  improvement 
in  health  and  happiness  are  physical  and  material, 
enough,  good  food,  better  wages,  pure  water,  pure 
air.  But  to  get  these  the  first  and  most  practically 
fundamental  task  is  to  quicken  popular  imagination, 
make  it  capable  of  picturing  something  better  and 
of  realizing  the  faults  of  the  present  and  the  past. 
It  has  long  been  a  classic  lament  of  moralists  that 
the  two  things  which  the  mass  of  humanity  was 
most  determined  to  have,  were  panem  et  circenses 


FICTION  AS  A  DIET  341 

(bread  and  games).  And  the  fact  that  they  will 
often  put  up  with  a  pretty  slender  amount  of 
doubtful  quality  of  bread,  if  they  could  get  plenty 
of  games,  has  been  shrewdly  used  for  his  own  ad- 
vantage by  the  tyrant  and  exploiter  in  every  age. 
But  their  instinct  was  perfectly  sound.  "Man 
cannot  live  by  bread  alone,  but  by  every  word  that 
proceeded  out  of  the  mouth  of  God,"  certainly 
included  legend  and  song  and  story  and  the  drama 
and  the  pomp  of  great  festivals  and  rejoicings, 
unless  there  be  many  things  in  this  world  which 
were  not  created  by  the  Almighty. 

We  have  all  heard  and  echoed  mechanically 
that  the  imagination  is  the  noblest  gift  of  man, 
but  we  do  not  adequately  realize  what  a  tremen- 
dously vital,  practical,  fundamental  part  it  plays 
in  the  welfare  and  progress  of  mankind.  The 
moment  you  start  to  improve  upon  anything, 
you  must  use  your  imagination.  Of  course  we 
recognize  at  once  that  the  great  inventor,  the 
discoverer  of  some  new  and  far-reaching  truth, 
must  have  a  "wonderful  imagination";  but  we  do 
not  see  so  clearly  that  no  one  can  build  a  house  or 
shoe  a  horse,  or  dig  a  ditch,  or  cook  a  dinner,  or  make 
a  dress  decently  and  creditably  without  using  the 
imagination.  The  man  who  has  no  imagination  is 
a  failure  as  a  craftsman;  the  woman  who  has  no 
imagination  makes  a  mess  of  her  housekeeping  sim- 
ply because  no  two  tasks  or  no  two  conditions  are 


342  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

ever  precisely  alike,  and  the  one  who  clings  mechani- 
cally to  the  old  routine,  the  ancient  rule  of  thumb 
without  ability  to  see  where  it  not  only  can,  but 
must,  be  modified  will  score  the  largest  and  most 
serious  percentage  of  failures  in  the  long  run.  In 
the  language  of  biology,  he  cannot  adjust  himself 
to  his  environment  and  hence  cannot  survive. 

One  of  the  most  extraordinary  things  about  our 
amazing  system  of  education  is  that,  while  it  con- 
centrates its  gravest  and  most  ponderous  attention 
upon  the  memory,  the  reason  and  the  intellect, 
it  leaves  the  cultivation  of  the  imagination  largely 
to  chance.  The  stories  which  the  child  hears  in 
the  home  and  on  the  streets,  the  romantic  and 
highly  improbable  accounts  of  his  own  adventures 
which  he  constructs  and  recites  to  his  fellows,  the 
dime  novels  and  the  penny-dreadful,  the  stones 
of  Indians  and  pirates  and  detectives  that  he 
smuggles  into  his  desk  and  under  his  pillow  — 
these  are  the  only  food  which  the  worshippers  of  the 
Three  R's  provide  for  the  development  of  his  noblest 
faculty.  What  wonder  that  he  gulps  them  down 
with  ravenous  indiscrimination  as  a  thirsty  child 
would  muddy  water,  or  a  starving  one  half-cooked 
food.  The  very  eagerness  of  his  craving  for  fiction 
shows  its  vital  importance  to  him.  The  greatest 
possible  service  of  education,  and  one  which  it 
practically  does  not  perform  at  present,  is  to  train 
a  child  to  grasp  and  master  a  situation  and  adjust 


FICTION  AS  A  DIET  343 

himself  to  it.  But  he  cannot  possibly  do  this  with- 
out a  constructive  use  of  his  imagination.  Any 
food  however  coarse  or  rank  which  will  start  him 
to  thinking  for  himself,  to  imagine  new  possibilities, 
to  dream  of  better  things  will  do  him  a  more  price- 
less service  than  any  amount  of  mechanical  drilling 
or  cramming  of  his  memory.  Information,  no 
matter  how  useful  or  important,  is  of  no  value 
until  it  has  been  digested,  and  the  only  faculty 
of  the  mind  which  contains  any  pepsin  is  the 
imagination. 

From  the  point  of  view  of  bodily  health  as  well 
as  mental  efficiency,  you  might  as  well  let  your 
liver  go  to  sleep  as  your  imagination.  Only  get 
a  child  or  a  man  to  read  and  enjoy  reading,  and 
form  the  habit  of  it,  and  you  have  taken  the 
longest  single  step  toward  leading  him  to  think 
and  to  act  for  himself.  This  is  why  the  powers 
that  be,  whether  temporal  or  ecclesiastic,  have 
usually  opposed  education  save  when  they  could 
turn  it  into  channels  which  would  be  harmless 
to  themselves  and  have  always  opposed  the  printing 
press  and  the  newspaper  because  they  never  could 
control  them.  Not  a  little  of  the  still  surviving 
denunciation  of  "trashy  fiction,"  and  the  "sen- 
sational press"  is  a  survivor  of  this  attitude  of  mind. 
It  makes  comparatively  little  difference  what  a 
child  or  a  class  reads  to  begin  with;  the  main  thing 
is  to  form  the  habit,  and  his  instincts  can  be  trusted 


344  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

steadily  to  lead  him  to  something  better.  A  stolid, 
impenetrable,  pachydermatous  imagination  is  the 
greatest  foe  of  progress  and  enemy  of  human  wel- 
fare. Any  means  which  cultivates  and  stimulates 
it  within  reasonable  limits  will  cultivate  and  en- 
large every  other  faculty  of  the  human  mind  and 
body  as  well. 

Give  a  man  a  lively  imagination  and  a  keen 
sense  of  humour  and  you  have  provided  him  with 
the  best  possible  antidote  against  mental  dry-rot 
and  its  second  cousins,  indolence  and  prejudice. 
A  stunted,  diseased  imagination  is  the  mother 
of  delusions;  and  the  best  cure  for  them  is  not 
merely  more  intelligence,  but  a  broader  and  more 
powerful  imagination.  A  sound  and  vigorous  imagi- 
nation, instead  of  proving  a  cause  of  rash  action 
and  unsound  judgment,  is  one  of  the  best  possible 
mental  balance-wheels.  The  child  or  the  man 
with  a  dwarfed  imagination  is  robbed  of  one  of 
his  most  priceless  birthrights.  It  is  of  course  a 
truism  that  it  is  the  only  creative  faculty  of  the 
mind  and  the  one  whose  exercise  gives  us  the  greatest 
and  the  purest  pleasure.  Food  for  the  imagination 
is  just  as  necessary  as  food  for  the  intellect  or  food 
for  the  stomach.  No  man  whose  imagination  is 
warped  is  going  to  live  healthfully  and  happily, 
either  mentally,  physically  or  morally. 

It  is  not  a  question  of  whether  we  will  feed  this 
faculty  of  ours  or  not,  but  simply  on  what  and 


FICTION  AS  A  DIET  345 

how  it  will  feed  itself,  and  if  it  cannot  get  wholesome 
food  it  will  eat  garbage.  But  primarily  and  fun- 
damentally it  prefers  sound  food,  and  nothing 
but  the  absence  of  it  will  drive  it  to  devour  trash 
and  offal. 

Happily  in  childhood  Nature  provides  food  for 
the  imagination  in  such  profusion  that  all  our  stu- 
pidity and  perversity  can  scarcely  succeed  in 
starving  the  flame.  The  glory  in  the  grass,  the 
wonder  in  the  flower,  the  light  that  never  was  on 
sea  or  land,  touches  and  gilds  the  smallest  and 
commonest  of  everyday  things  about  us.  No 
matter  whether  the  things  themselves  are  attractive, 
or  even  useful  or  not,  their  mere  existence  is  gilded 
by  the  magic  of  our  childish  vision  until  it  becomes 
a  source  of  pleasure  in  itself.  As  Stevenson,  with 
that  wondrous  insight  into  the  very  heart  of  the 
child  mind,  sang: 

The  world  is  so  full  of  a  number  of  things, 
I'm  sure  we  should  all  be  as  happy  as  kings. 

And,  heaven  be  praised,  we  are  unless  some 
"grown-up"  positively  goes  out  of  his  way,  whether 
by  endeavour  or  neglect,  or  scarcely  less  often 
by  well-meant  interference  and  instruction,  to  pre- 
vent it!  His  delight  in  myth  and  legend  and  fairy 
tale,  which  is  just  beginning  to  be  recognized  even 
by  educators  is  nature's  royal  road  to  learning, 
.wondrous  romances  which  he  will  construct  either 


346  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

of  his  own  adventures,  presumably  in  some  previous 
incarnation,  or  of  the  habits  and  doings  of  some 
imaginary  friends  and  playmates  of  his  who  come 
to  him  in  the  dusk!  His  vivid  transformation  of  a 
walking-stick  into  a  prancing  charger,  of  a  couple 
of  chairs  on  the  nursery  floor  into  the  Flying  Dutch- 
man, and  fat  old  Fido  into  any  kind  of  ravenous 
beast  required  by  the  artistic  necessities  of  the 
situation,  from  a  Jabberwock  to  a  "pole  bearer," 
all  show  his  power  of  developing  his  highest  single 
faculty  —  that  of  putting  two  things  together  and 
out  of  them  creating  a  new  and  different  third. 

Even  here  his  unspoiled  taste  is  sound.  He 
would  rather  have  stories  of  birds  and  butterflies 
and  flowers  and  grass  and  trees,  of  sun  and  wind 
than  stories  of  ghosts  and  demons  and  gods  and 
goddesses.  Give  him  plenty  of  happy,  breezy, 
wholesome  and  intrinsically  true  stories  of  the 
living  world  about  him,  and  he  will  not  crave, 
in  fact  will  be  positively  repelled  by,  those  morbid 
echoes  of  jealousy,  murder  and  lust  which  play  so 
large  a  part  in  myth  and  legend  and  folk-story 
and  Old  Testament  story. 

While  many  of  these  myths  and  legends  are  of 
the  keenest  interest  and  enjoyment  to  the  child, 
I  frankly  confess  that  I  cannot  help  feeling  that 
their  indiscriminate  use  can  easily  become  a  source 
of  harm  and  that  they  should  be  most  carefully 
selected  and  modernized  for  the  use  of  the  child. 


FICTION  AS  A  DIET  347 

Most  of  them  are  tinged  with  that  profound  melan- 
choly of  the  earlier  ages  of  mankind  which  still 
exists  in  savages.  Man  is  but  a  pigmy  and  the 
sport  of  swarms  of  higher  powers,  some  friendly 
but  more  of  them  malignant,  all  mischievous  and 
uncertain.  The  one  secret  of  success,  the  highest 
achievement,  is  not  boldly  to  face  and  conquer 
Fate,  but  to  cringe  before  her,  to  secure  the 
favour  of  some  god  by  some  act  however  dis- 
reputable, or  dishonourable,  to  get  control  of  some 
word  of  power,  some  trick,  some  magical  secret, 
some  invincible  sword.  The  game  of  life  is  never 
to  be  played  openly,  but  always  with  loaded  dice, 
and  the  man  or  woman  who  succeeds  is  the  tone 
who  is  most  craftily  successful  in  winning  the 
favour  of  the  most  powerful  of  the  generally  dis- 
reputable powers  that  be,  whether  God,  Djinn, 
or  Wizard.  A.  large  minority  of  these  myths  and 
stories,  whether  Greek,  Norse  or  Hebrew,  are  unfit 
to  be  told  to  a  clean-minded  child,  and  another 
considerable  percentage  of  them  are  so  utterly 
unjust  and  unfair  as  to  shock  his  native  sense 
of  right  and  justice.  The  story  of  Hector  and 
Achilles  for  instance,  of  Esau  and  Jacob,  or  of 
Baldur  and  Loki  take  an  immense  amount  of  de- 
cidedly sophisticated  explanation  and  befogging 
before  he  can  be  induced  to  regard  them  as  fair  or 
even  decent. 

I  can  conceive  of  no  better  means  of  riveting 


348  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

in  his  mind  the  firm  conviction  that  trickery  will 
always  vanquish  honesty,  favouritism  conquer  merit, 
and  error  be  stronger  than  truth  than  an  indiscrimi- 
nate course  of  these  tales  and  stories. 

But  when  the  magic  carpet  of  reading  is  placed 
at  his  command,  his  immediate  surroundings  become 
too  limited,  too  prosaic,  and  he  begins  to  fly  hither 
and  thither,  sitting  cross-legged  upon  it  to  the 
uppermost  parts  of  the  earth;  he  sails  the  Spanish 
Main,  leaps  over  reeking  bulwarks  and  steps  over 
stones  slippery  with  blood,  with  his  bosom  friends 
and  ideals,  the  pirates. 

They  are  not  usually  men  "of  much  moral 
principle,"  as  Mr.  A.  Ward  apologetically  remarks, 
but  they  are  not  a  pin  worse,  even  in  the  yellowest  of 
the  yellow-backs,  than  the  gentlemen  adventurers 
of  the  sixteenth  century,  and  they  are  three  whole 
grades  in  the  rogue's  gallery  above  any  god  or 
goddess  yet  invented.  The  same  is  true  of  the 
Boy  Outlaw  and  the  Terror  of  the  Everglades. 
The  heart  of  these  swashbuckling  heroes  is  always 
in  the  right  place,  even  if  their  heads  and  heels 
indulge  in  some  strange  capers.  The  desperado 
who  is  the  bravest,  the  most  generous,  the  most 
faithful  to  his  friends  and  most  magnanimous  to 
his  enemies,  the  most  chivalrous  to  women  and  the 
kindest  to  the  poor  is  the  one  who  emerges  trium- 
phant in  the  long  run,  eight  times  out  of  ten. 

No  less  romantic  and  less  vivid  are  the  imaginings 


FICTION  AS  A  DIET  349 

of  the  mind  of  the  girl,  but  her  fancy  takes  a  gentler 
and  softer  turn.  The  dignities  and  delights  of 
housekeeping  and  of  home  making,  the  care  of 
wondrously  beautiful  and  brilliant  children,  the 
charm  of  diamonds  and  silk  dresses  and  beautiful 
carriages  and  princely  romances.  Later  the  dis- 
covery, the  wondrous  revelation  of  the  prince 
beautiful,  with  the  raven  locks  and  the  marble 
brow  and  the  soulful,  piercing  eyes.  He  will 
probably  have  a  snub  nose  and  freckles  and  hair 
like  a  shoe-brush  when  he  comes,  but  he  will  be  the 
prince  beautiful  just  the  same.  It  is  not  too  much 
to  say  that  a  boy's  ideals,  his  standards,  his  notions 
of  what  success  really  consists  in  and  what  is  best 
worth  while,  his  attitude  toward  women,  his  attitude 
toward  the  nation  and  the  race  is  as  largely  moulded 
and  determined  by  the  fiction  that  he  reads  and 
delights  in  as  by  any  other  single  factor. 

The  same  is  equally  true  of  the  girl  and  her  ideals. 
They  both  will  dream  dreams  and  build  castles  in 
the  air,  and  construct  their  ideals  out  of  some  sort 
of  material.  The  question  is,  What  kind  of  raw 
material  are  you  furnishing  for  the  fabric  of  these 
visions  ?  or  are  you  letting  them  go  out  into  the  high- 
ways and  hedges  and  glean  for  themselves?  It  is 
as  cruel  and  as  injurious  to  deprive  a  growing 
boy  or  a  budding  girl  of  an  abundance  of  sound, 
wholesome,  enjoyable  fiction  as  it  is  to  debar  them 
from  butter  on  their  bread  and  sugar  on  their 


350  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

porridge.  It  is  best,  of  course,  to  provide  this 
supply  of  imagination  food  from  real  life. 
There  are  plenty  of  real  flesh  and  blood  heroes 
both  in  the  past  and  round  about  us  in  the  present, 
much  superior  to  any  demigod  or  saint,  but  just 
as  the  great  artist  does  not  merely  hold  the  mirror 
up  to  nature,  but  holds  it  in  such  a  way  as  to  make 
his  picture  not  only  literal  truth  but  the  emblem 
of  the  eternal  verities  as  well,  so  the  gifted  word 
painter  can  draw  a  figure  or  tell  a  story  which 
in  the  strictest  sense  is  truer  even  and  more  con- 
vincing than  the  precisest  and  most  strictly  accurate 
recital  of  any  single  individual  fact. 

We  love  the  characters  in  the  novel  as  we  seldom 
do  people  in  real  life,  because  the  artist  lias  enabled 
us  to  recognize  in  them  the  eternal  and  never- 
dying  triumphs  and  failures,  loves  and  hates,  hopes 
and  fears  of  humanity.  This  is  why,  while  we  are 
often  fearfully  bored  by  even  our  best  friends, 
if  we  see  too  much  of  them,  we  never  lose  interest 
in  Colonel  Newcombe,  Tristram  Shandy,  Jeanie 
Deans,  *Mr.  Pickwick,  Leather  Stocking,  Sir  John 
Falstaff  and  Becky  Sharp. 

In  the  early  days  when  reading  and  writing 
were  gifts  to  marvel  at,  this  love  of  the  adventure, 
of  the  new,  of  the  more  beautiful,  finding,  alas! 
often  too  little  to  feed  upon  in  its  immediate  sur- 
roundings, could  be  gratified  only  through  the  arts 
of  the  story  teller,  the  minnesinger  and  the  bard. 


FICTION  AS  A  DIET  351 

And  there  is  no  more  lucrative,  influential  pro- 
fession, over  something  like  two  thirds  of  the  earth's 
surface  still  to-day,  than  that  of  the  man  who  has 
the  gift  of  living  and  convincing  story  telling. 

As  the  story  teller  began  to  heighten  his  effects 
first  by  intonation  and  by  gesture  —  pantomime 
—  the  calling  in  of  the  accessories  for  dialogue  and 
combat,  the  use  of  backgrounds,  costumes  and  scenic 
effects,  the  second  great  food  of  the  imagination, 
the  drama,  developed.  This  still  holds,  and  de- 
servedly, all  over  the  face  of  the  earth  in  every 
possible  stage  of  culture  and  civilization,  a  high  and 
unshakable  place  in  the  affection  and  the  regard 
of  the  human  race.  For  vigour  of  appeal,  for  elec- 
tric stimulation  and  vivifying  of  the  emotions  and 
fancy,  it  still  holds  the  highest  place.  Bold  and 
even  at  times  shameless  as  it  is  in  depicting  life 
exactly  as  it  exists,  and  from  all  possible  points  of 
view  with  both  the  varnish  left  off  and  the  cant 
left  out,  the  net  result  of  its  influence  is  over- 
whelmingly stimulating,  invigorating  and  elevating. 
It  makes  men  and  women  think  and  feel  with 
others  and  for  others  in  spite  of  themselves.  It 
develops  sympathy  and  helpfulness,  it  takes  the 
individual  out  of  himself  and  the  rut  in  which 
he  is  living;  it  enables  him  to  see,  above  the  smoke 
and  grime  of  the  market  place,  the  beauty  of  the 
great  fiery  virtues  —  courage,  devotion,  honour, 
vitality,  friendship  and  patriotism. 


352  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

While  some  of  its  displays  of  vice  and  headstrong 
passion  and  lawlessness  are  temporarily  attractive, 
and  its  allusions  to  gilded  frailties  too  suggestive 
and  apologetic  at  times,  its  ultimate  ethics  are 
overwhelmingly  sound  and  its  morality,  indeed, 
abjectly  and  almost  absurdly  Sunday-school-like  in 
its  propriety  and  conventionality.  Its  villain  may 
be  an  accomplished  person  of  wondrous  address  with 
sword,  or  pistol,  or  tongue,  or  all  three,  and  may  in 
the  first  and  second  acts  triumph  over  and  inflict 
all  sorts  of  bodily  and  mental  agonies  upon  his 
innocent  victims,  but  he  is  hall-marked  from  the 
moment  of  his  entry  by  his  scowl,  or  his  sneer. 
His  villainy  is  so  plainly  stamped  all  over  him 
that  anywhere,  outside  of  stage-land,  he  would  be 
arrested  at  sight,  or  mobbed  on  the  street;  he  is 
hissed  by  the  gallery  at  his  every  appearance,  and 
he  is  nine  times  out  of  ten  utterly  foiled  or 
confounded  in  the  long  run  and  driven  out  into 
the  darkness  of  an  undying  remorse,  if  he  escapes 
being  perforated,  split,  or  blown  up  on  the  spot. 
The  impossibly  noble  and  pulp-headed  hero  and 
the  incredibly  virtuous  and  brainless  heroine  tri- 
umph victoriously  in  the  end,  their  virtue  alone, 
by  sheer  mass  play,  being  able  to  overcome  the 
obvious  defects  in  their  intelligences.  The  net 
influence  of  the  stage  has  been  overwhelmingly 
moral  and  wholesome,  ever  since  it  got  rid  of  gods 
and  goddesses  with  their  injustices,  their  petty 


FICTION  AS  A  DIET  353 

jealousies  and  perpetual  interference  in  affairs  as 
dramatis  persona. 

But  the  stage,  vivid  and  stimulating  as  it  was,  still 
was  lacking  in  breadth  and  universality  of  appeal, 
and  in  pure  and  unspoiled  human  interest.  No 
theatre  or  amphitheatre,  however  large,  will  contain 
at  one  time  more  than  a  few  thousands  of  the  popu- 
lation of  the  nation  or  government  by  which  it  is 
supported;  no  drama  or  spectacle,  however  fre- 
quently repeated,  could  hope  to  be  witnessed  by 
and  to  reach  more  than  a  small  per  cent,  of  the 
people.  It  remained  for  the  invention  of  man's 
greatest  instrument  of  triumph  over  ignorance, 
prejudice,  conservatism  and  injustice  —  the  printing 
press  —  to  render  possible  the  highest,  fairest  and 
most  democratic  means  for  the  cultivation  of  the 
imagination  —  the  novel. 

The  novel  is  nothing  more  than  the  story  turned 
into  visible  form  by  the  black  magic  of  the  printer's 
art  and  spread  before  the  eyes  of  tens  of  thousands 
of  readers  in  place  of  recited  by  word  of  mouth 
in  the  hearing  of  tens  or  scores;  or  the  drama, 
spread  upon  the  printed  page,  and  witnessed  in 
the  stage  setting  of  their  own  minds  by  millions  of 
readers,  instead  of  hundreds  of  spectators.  But 
there  is  a  difference  and  a  striking  one.  The  novel 
has  risen  to  a  distinctly  higher  plane  and  clearer 
atmosphere  than  the  story  or  drama,  by  improving 
the  justice  and  the  life  truthfulness  of  its  con- 


354  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

ventions,  by  making  the  rules  of  the  game  fairer 
and  more  humane.  It  has  got  rid  of  at  least  two 
hampering  and  indeed  demoralizing  postulates  and 
influences,  the  hereditary  hero  and  the  patron 
god  or  goddess. 

A  large  percentage  of  even  the  most  deathless 
legends  and  stories  of  the  heroic  age  are  absolutely 
repulsive  to  our  modern  sense  of  fairness  and  de- 
cency. What  would  we  think  of  a  soldier  of  to-day 
who  would  rush  into  battle  and  perform  prodigies 
of  valour  and  skill  upon  his  foes,  knowing  himself 
to  be  in  some  magic  armour  which  was  both  bullet- 
proof and  sword-proof,  like  Achilles  at  the  Siege 
of  Troy?  To  our  modern  eye,  Achilles,  far  from 
being  a  hero,  is  a  sulky,  ill-conditioned  cur  and 
richly  deserved  the  disgraceful  and  ignominious 
fate  which  he  inflicted  upon  the  modest,  brave, 
loving  and  manly  Hector.  Achilles  was  infinitely 
the  smaller  man  of  the  two  physically,  mentally 
and  morally,  but  happened  to  be  the  favourite  of 
the  powers  higher  up  and  Hector  didn't;  hence  the 
inevitable  result.  In  the  whole  of  the  "Iliads" 
and  "Odysseys"  there  is  scarcely  a  single  hero  who 
stands  fairly  and  squarely  upon  his  own  merits. 
He  is  simply  a  puppet  in  the  hands  of  some  spiteful 
goddess  or  disreputable  god,  and  the  one  who  has 
the  strongest  heavenly  backer  is  the  one  who  carries 
off  the  prize.  At  every  stage  in  the  story  our  in- 
terest is  broken,  our  sense  of  fair  play  and  decency 


FICTION  AS  A  DIET  355 

outraged  by  the  interference  of  some  contemptible 
Olympian,  throwing  a  net  of  invisible  cords  over 
the  head  of  one  hero,  so  that  his  brave  adversary 
could  hammer  him  to  death  with  perfect  safety, 
swooping  down  in  the  form  of  an  eagle  upon  the 
helmet  of  one  real  man  who  happened  to  get  into 
the  book,  and  picking  at  his  eyes  and  blinding  him 
with  its  wings  in  order  to  keep  him  from  chastising, 
as  he  richly  deserved,  the  cowardly  pet  of  the  god- 
dess. The  moment  a  god  comes  into  the  story, 
the  human  interest  is  broken  and  usually  half  the 
properties  and  the  decencies  as  well. 

Man's  gods  are  usually  worse  than  himself  and 
the  embodiment  of  his  vices  rather  than  his  virtues. 
If  any  personage  or  power,  however  exalted,  at- 
tempted to  employ  on  the  field  of  battle  or  even  in 
a  football  game  or  a  baseball  match,  or  a  prize 
fight,  one  tenth  of  the  interference,  the  unfairness, 
trickery  and  favouritism  which  the  gods  of  all 
the  heroic  legends  habitually  exercised  and  employed, 
they  would  be  fairly  swept  out  of  existence  by  a 
storm  of  popular  indignation  and  contempt.  Such 
tricks  are  still  resorted  to,  such  interference  prac- 
tised in  the  lower  world  of  business  and  politics, 
but  it  is  the  most  wholesome  sign  of  the  times  that 
they  will  no  longer  be  tolerated  in  the  purer 
atmosphere  of  the  ideal  world  of  the  drama  and  the 
novel.  Nor  in  that  realm  of  human  activity,  man- 
aged by  real  men,  war  and  athletic  sports. 


356  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

There  are  three  great  foods  for  the  growth  and 
fields  for  the  training  of  the  imagination:  the  story, 
whether  spoken  or  sung,  the  drama  and  the  novel. 
"These  three,  and  the  greatest  of  these  is"  the  novel. 
It  is  the  best  food  for  fancy  ever  invented  —  the 
sanest,  the  most  wholesome,  the  most  accessible. 
The  ethics  and  the  morale  of  the  prize  ring  are 
superior  to  those  of  the  stock  exchange  and  the 
convention.  In  the  novel  all  the  favouritism  and 
injustice  of  the  legends  and  classic  plays  are  changed; 
its  characters  are  men  and  women  of  flesh  and  blood 
like  ourselves.  They  start  fairly  and  squarely 
from  the  scratch  in  the  race,  the  game  begins  with 
all  the  cards  on  the  table,  face  upmost.  There  are 
differences,  of  course,  of  station,  of  birth,  of  financial 
condition,  of  bodily  and  mental  gifts  among  them; 
but  these  in  all  real  literature  are  carefully  stated 
and  explained,  so  that  the  players  are  accurately 
handicapped  by  them  and  carry  weight  accordingly. 
The  fact  is  brought  out  that  every  peculiarity  has 
its  compensation;  every  disadvantage,  its  corres- 
ponding advantage,  and  the  two  starters  in  the  race 
are  given  places  of  advantage  or  disadvantage  ac- 
cording to  previous  accomplisments;  the  two  contest- 
ants for  the  love  of  the  fair  lady  are  weighed  into  the 
ring  at  as  nearly  as  possible  at  the  same  avoirdu- 
pois. The  manly  beauty  and  vigour  of  the  unspoiled 
child  of  the  people  are  offset  by  the  wealth  and  cun- 
ning of  the  dissipated  slip  of  gentility  who  is  his  rival. 


FICTION  AS  A  DIET  357 

The  game  is  played  out  under  the  open  skies, 
man  against  man  and  woman  against  woman. 
The  villain  is  not  all  black  or  the  hero  all  white. 
Each  has  the  defects  of  his  virtues  and  each  re- 
ceives in  the  main,  the  legitimate  returns  upon 
such  intelligence,  courage  and  sincerity  as  he  may 
possess.  The  conqueror  does  not  throw  him  to 
the  vultures  afterward  and  sell  his  wife  and  children 
into  slavery.  Everything  is  done  with  fairness 
and  decency  and  humanity.  But  the  interest  is 
not  a  whit  less  intense  and  absorbing,  rather  indeed 
the  greater,  because  you  recognize  that  it  is  a  clean 
and  honourable  fight  to  the  finish  according  to 
decent  and  well  recognized  rules,  without  favouri- 
tism, or  interference  from  the  gods  or  the  fates, 
except  in  so  far  as  they  may  have  granted  different 
hereditary  endowments  to  the  contestants.  It 
is  the  spirit  of  the  game  that  charms  and  holds  you, 
not  the  ultimate  result,  but  the  feeling  that  you 
have  witnessed  a  clean,  genuine  contest  of  skill 
and  strength  in  which  both  have  put  forth  their 
utmost  powers,  and  both  had  a  fair  chance.  No 
one  would  pay  a  penny  to  go  and  see  the  Podunck 
high  school  nine  beaten  by  the  Giants,  or  any 
other  favourite  of  the  gods;  or  any  game  in  which 
there  was  a  suspicion  of  a  "frame  up,"  but  would 
cheerfully  put  down  his  last  dollar  to  see  a  real 
fight  for  the  championship  between  the  Cubs  and 
the  Pirates. 


358  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

The  novel  has  developed  advantages  over  the 
drama  in  duration  of  interest  and  wholesome- 
ness  in  so  far  as  it  has  got  away  from  the  His- 
torical Personage  and  the  foregone  conclusion. 
Whenever  a  king  or  a  general  or  a  great  states- 
man is  introduced  into  a  story,  the  tendency  is 
almost  irresistible  to  magnify  him  so  as  to  dwarf 
all  the  other  characters.  Whatever  he  particu- 
larly wants,  it  is  more  or  less  preordained  that  he 
must  have.  And  while  certain  liberties  may  be 
taken,  with  relatively  minor  incidents  in  his  career, 
such  as  the  ladies  that  he  falls  in  love  with,  or  the 
games  of  golf  that  he  plays,  yet  in  the  main  the 
majority  of  his  adventures  must  conform  to  the 
rigid  and  unescapable  facts  of  history.  You  cannot 
possibly  send  him  to  exile  or  degrade  him  to  ob- 
scurity whenever  the  dramatic  interests  of  the  story 
demand  it,  as  you  could  an  imaginary  character. 
The  historical  play  and  the  historical  novel  alike 
are  almost  compelled  to  concern  themselves  either 
with  comparatively  trivial  escapades  in  the  life  and 
prospects  of  a  great  person,  or  introduce  him  pon- 
derously from  time  to  time  as  a  huge  and  cumbrous 
lay  figure  upon  the  stage  and  make  the  interest 
centre  in  the  doing  and  adventures  of  the  lesser 
personages  of  the  story. 

The  modern  novel  then,  whether  the  shilling 
shocker  or  the  six-shilling  three-decker,  has  many 
claims  to  be  regarded  as  the  broadest  and  most 


FICTION  AS  A  DIET  359 

democratic  field  and  means  for  the  cultivation  of 
the  highest  powers  of  man  that  the  world  has  yet 
seen.  So  far  from  making  a  man  or  a  woman 
shallow  and  frivolous  and  frothy,  it  broadens  his 
horizon,  it  deepens  his  sympathies,  it  kindles  his 
imagination,  it  shows  him  the  defects  of  the 
present,  and  the  possible  beauties  and  triumphs 
of  the  future.  An  abundance  of  novels  are  in 
our  mental  diet  what  plenty  of  fruit  and  fresh 
vegetables  are  in  our  physical  one,  not  merely 
a  source  of  legitimate  and  wholesome  enjoyment, 
but  most  necessary  to  life,  health  and  progress. 
They  are  the  best  and  most  accessible  means  of 
lifting  us  out  of  ourselves  and  the  rut  we  have  got 
into,  calling  away  the  blood  from  the  overworked 
and  overdriven  areas  of  our  brain  and  sending 
it  coursing  through  the  starved  and  under-exercised 
ones.  Once  we  come  under  their  magic  spell, 
we  have  thrown  off  the  livery  and  the  bondage 
of  our  trade  and  our  occupation  and  become  just 
men  and  women  again,  living  the  life,  thrilling 
with  the  joy,  pulsating  with  the  passions  of  the  whole 
race.  Pure,  sound  fiction  does  not  need  to  have  a 
moral  or  be  instructive  or  conceal  a  sermon,  but 
just  to  be  a  first-class  story,  keeping  to  the  rules  of 
the  game,  as  wholesome  for  the  mind  and  morals 
as  sunshine  is  for  the  body. 

The    most  restful  thing  for   a   tired   brain   and 
overwrought  nervous   system  is,  first  a  brisk,  en- 


360  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

joyable  walk  or  a  keen,  eager  game  in  the  open 
air  followed  by  a  hundred  pages  or  so  of  a  good 
novel.  You  will  sleep  better,  go  back  to  your  work 
next  day  fresher  and  better  rested  than  if  you 
had  endeavoured  to  crowd  your  brain  with  ad- 
ditional information  or  instruction  for  practical 
use  in  your  life  work.  Many  stories,  of  course, 
of  real  life,  of  adventure,  biography,  of  travel, 
of  the  newest  achievements  and  discoveries  in  the 
wonder  world  of  science,  are  as  interesting,  as 
fascinating  and,  in  moderate  doses,  as  refreshing 
as  a  novel  or  a  good  story;  but  most  of  them,  how- 
ever keen  their  interest  and  fascinating  their  appeal, 
are  still  adding  additional  fatigue  poisons  to  the 
store  already  in  your  blood,  while  the  novel  is  prac- 
tically doing  nothing  but  washing  these  out  of  the 
overworked  areas  of  your  brain.  The  very  "brain- 
lessness"  of  the  novel  is  one  of  its  greatest 
advantages,  the  fact  that  it  can  be  read  without 
effort,  almost  \vithout  recognition,  that  it  carries 
you  along  on  its  flowing  stream  like  a  dead  leaf 
on  a  river,  is  one  of  its  strongest  points  from  the 
point  of  view  of  health.  If  men  oftener  read  until 
they  forgot  their  troubles,  there  would  not  be  half 
as  much  drinking  for  the  same  purpose.  I  regard 
it  as  one  of  the  most  useful  rules  of  mental  health 
to  keep  on  hand  constantly  at  least  one  good  novel, 
no  matter  who  it  is  by,  or  what  it  is  about,  so  long 
as  it  tells  a  good  story  and  paints  things  as  they 


FICTION  AS  A  DIET  361 

really  are.  And  at  least  once  a  day,  preferably 
just  before  going  to  bed  at  night,  plunge  into  it 
long  enough  to  forget  yourself  and  be  unwilling 
to  stop.  It  will  make  your  sleep  sounder,  your 
brain  clearer  and  your  temper  sweeter  and  saner 
than  almost  any  other  form  of  mental  exercise 
that  I  know. 

If  you  are  tired  a  good  novel  will  rest  you;  if 
you  are  worried,  it  will  make  you  forget  your  worries 
and  yourself;  if  you  are  sick,  it  is  one  of  your  best 
medicines.  The  man  or  woman  who,  in  the  sunset 
afterglow  of  life,  can  enjoy  a  good  story  has  found 
the  secret  of  perpetual  youth. 


CHAPTER  XVI 

OVERWORKED    CHILDREN    ON   THE    FARM   AND   IN   THE 

SCHOOL 

CHILD  labour  is  as  old  as  civilization.  In- 
deed, in  all  but  name,  it  is  far  older  than 
civilization,  for  the  child  of  the  savage  has 
to  forage  for  himself  and  fight  for  his  own  food  from 
the  time  he  is  able  to  crawl.  In  savagery,  the  child 
works  for  himself;  in  barbarism,  for  his  parents;  in 
civilization,  for  a  factory.  He  simply  changes 
taskmasters  with  the  ages,  and  the  sternest  and 
most  cruel  of  all  was  the  first.  More  children 
die  of  starvation,  disease,  and  neglect  in  the  healthiest 
tribe  of  "noble  savages"  that  now  exists,  than  in 
the  vilest  slum  of  our  factory  towns  under  civili- 
zation. There  is  abundant  ground  for  being 
ashamed  of  ourselves,  little  or  none  for  discourage- 
ment or  fear  that  the  stamina  of  the  race  is  being 
undermined,  or  its  continued  existence  threatened 
by  child  labour.  The  race  is  not  deteriorating,  even 
the  child  of  the  factory  slums  is  one  and  one  half 
inches  taller  and  seven  pounds  heavier  than  he  was 
thirty  years  ago.  So  far  as  data  are  available,  it 
seems  almost  certain  that  there  never  was,  in  any 

362 


OVERWORKED  CHILDREN  363 

previous  age  of  the  world,  as  little  harmful  child 
labour  as  in  the  present  one.  The  magnificent  and 
beneficent  series  of  laws  and  regulations  forbidding 
harmful  child  labour  which  have  been  placed  upon 
the  statute  books  of  all  civilized  countries  and  states 
are  simply  a  living  demonstration  of  an  awakened 
public  conscience  upon  this  subject  which  did  not 
exist  before.  The  evil  was  present  in  abundance, 
but  so  diffused  as  to  make  no  pointed  appeal 
to  public  sentiment,  and  so  universal  that  it  was 
accepted  as  a  matter  of  course. 

It  is  gravely  to  be  doubted  whether  the  invention 
of  machinery  and  consequent  development  of  the 
factory  system,  making  the  labour  of  children  more 
valuable,  since  brute  strength  was  no  longer  re- 
quired, upon  the  whole  increased  either  the  amount 
or  the  harmfulness  of  child  labour.  It  simply 
concentrated,  and,  so  to  speak,  advertised,  its  evil 
consequences,  just  as  the  poverty,  malnutrition, 
dirt,  and  disease  of  a  hundred  thousand  peasants 
and  agricultural  labourers  when  scattered  out  over  a 
whole  country-side  or  province  escape  our  obser- 
vation, but  horrify  us  when  they  are  concentrated 
into  four  or  five  acres  of  a  city  slum.  When  chil- 
dren are  overworked  by  the  score  and  by  the  hun- 
dred in  factories,  in  full  view  of  the  public,  so  that 
streams  of  their  pale  faces  and  stunted  forms  may  be 
seen  pouring  out  upon  the  open  street,  it  is  only  a 
question  of  time  when  the  public  conscience  will 


364  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

be  awakened  and  the  shame  forbidden  by  law.  So 
marked  has  been  this  effect  that  although  there  is 
yet  abundant  room  for  improvement,  taking  the 
civilized  world  as  a  whole,  the  child  in  the  factory, 
shop,  mine  and  mill  is  now  carefully  and  fairly 
efficiently  protected  by  wise,  thoughtful  and  hu- 
mane laws,  leaving  as  the  only  unprotected  classes 
the  children  upon  the  farm  and  in  the  school.  To 
what  extent  they  need  protection,  not  by  law,  but 
by  the  education  of  public  sentiment,  is  the  prob- 
lem of  this  chapter. 

Our  Child  Labour  organizations  have  been  so 
gratifyingly  successful  in  their  efforts  for  legislative 
reform  that  I  believe  the  time  has  come  for  them  to 
turn  their  attention  in  this  direction  as  well.  The 
relative  magnitude  of  the  problem  is  easily  indi- 
cated by  a  few  rough  figures.  According  to  the  last 
United  States  census  there  were,  of  children  under 
sixteen  years  of  age  in  the  United  States,  650,000 
employed  in  gainful  occupations  in  factory,  shop, 
mill,  etc.;  1,100,000  working  for  wages  upon  farms; 
and  roughly,  15,000,000  in  schools.  It  is  easily  seen 
where  the  greatest  possible  menace  to  the  future  of 
the  race  might  fall.  If  only  one  per  cent,  of  the 
children  in  schools  were  overworked  or  overconfined ; 
if  only  five  per  cent,  of  the  children  employed  upon 
farms,  including  those  working  at  home,  were  so  in- 
jured, it  would  work  more  injury  to  the  nation  than 
if  twenty  per  cent,  of  those  employed  in  shops  and 


OVERWORKED  CHILDREN  365 

factories  were  overworked.  Or  to  put  it  differently: 
If  all  the  children  employed  in  shops,  factories,  and 
mines  were  injuriously  overworked,  that  would  only 
be  the  equivalent  of  the  damage  done  if  ten 
per  cent,  of  the  children  upon  our  farms  and  five 
per  cent,  of  those  in  our  schools  were  overworked  or 
overconfined. 

That  overworking  and  underfeeding  of  children 
upon  the  farm  and  overworking  and  overconfining 
of  children  in  the  school  exist,  and  in  no  insignificant 
numbers,  few  of  experience  will  deny.  Most  of  us 
who  were  born  or  have  lived  in  the  country  will  have 
little  hesitation  in  testifying  that  at  least  ten  and 
probably  nearly  twenty  per  cent,  of  children  upon 
farms  are  overworked  and  underfed,from  land  hunger, 
traditional  ideas  of  economy,  Puritanic  notions  about 
discipline  and  "hardening"  and  "bearing  the  yoke 
in  one's  youth,"  or  from  sheer  ignorance  and  in- 
difference. While  there  are  many  admirable  and 
wholesome  features  about  life  on  a  farm,  so  that  it 
is  probably,  all  things  considered,  the  most  whole- 
some and  desirable  place  for  children  to  grow  up, 
it  has  also  its  defects. 

Those  of  us  who  happen  to  have  been  born  or 
raised  upon  a  farm,  a  real  farm,  run  to  earn  a  living 
and  not  as  a  healthful  and  very  expensive  amuse- 
ment, can  promptly  and  feelingly  testify  that  it  is 
not  half  so  rose-coloured  as  it  is  usually  pictured  in 
literature  or  through  the  pearly  mists  of  our  boyhood 


366  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

memories.  Farm  work  is  the  hardest  and  most 
disagreeable  work,  there  is,  with  the  longest  hours  and 
the  poorest  pay.  Much  of  it  has  to  be  done  before 
daylight  or  after  dark  in  mud,  in  snow,  in  storm  and 
slush.  Farm  bedrooms  are  cold  and  badly  ventilated, 
and  the  sheer  discomfort,  verging  at  times  upon 
agony,  of  getting  out  of  bed  on  a  winter's  morning 
and  starting  the  fire  with  damp  wood  in  a  kitchen 
that  feels  like  a  cold  storage  plant  in  January,  and 
then  going  out  to  thaw  the  pump,  shovel  a  path 
to  the  barn,  feed  the  shivering,  staring-coated  horses, 
and  milk  half  a  dozen  frost-rimed  cows,  is  still  fresh 
in  our  memories.  These  and  a  score  of  similarly 
cheerful  and  agreeable  memories  rise  before  us  like 
a  nightmare.  It  makes  little  difference  where  we 
may  have  gone,  or  what  our  lot  in  life,  we  never 
have  had  to  do  anything  so  disagreeable  since. 
Moreover,  while  there  is  an  abundance  of  food  grow- 
ing upon  the  farm,  that  food  is  raised  for  sale,  and 
wherever  the  balance  is  a  narrow  one  between  the 
income  and  expenditure,  as  it  is  in  most  of  farmers' 
families,  the  bulk  and  the  best  of  that  food  that  will 
bring  a  good  price  in  the  market  is  and  -must  be 
sold,  leaving  only  the  poorer  quality  for  home  use. 
In  short,  the  farmer  who  farms  for  a  living,  or  who 
expects  to  make  money,  must,  in  the  terse  language 
of  the  corner  grocery,  "-do  all  his  own  work,  and  live 
on  what  he  can't  sell." 

This  stern  necessity  reacts  upon  the  children  of  the 


OVERWORKED  CHILDREN  367 

farm  just  as  it  does  upon  those  of  the  factory  town, 
and  the  physician  in  country  practice  can  show  you 
in  the  remotest  and  most  peaceful  country  district 
as  severe  cases  of  malnutrition,  of  rickets,  of  anemia, 
of  diseases  of  the  joints  and  the  spine,  and  of  stunted 
development  as  you  can  find  in  a  city  hospital. 
There  will  not  be  so  many  of  them,  but  they  will  be 
there,  nevertheless,  except  in  unusually  prosperous 
and  well-to-do  neighbourhoods.  In  the  aggregate, 
I  think  it  would  be  safe  to  say  that  they  equal,  if 
they  do  not  far  exceed,  the  defectives  and  the  de- 
generates of  our  much  smaller  slum  population. 
Unquestionably,  a  large  majority  of  the  work  done 
by  children  upon  the  farm,  being  for  the  most  part 
in  the  open  air,  and  under  the  care  and  protection  of 
their  own  parents  or  relatives,  is  not  only  not  harm- 
ful but  decidedly  beneficial;  but  we  must  not  shut 
our  eyes  to  the  fact  that  young  children  and  boys 
and  girls  are  overworked  upon  farms,  badly  fed,  and 
deprived  of  proper  amusement  and  social  and  in- 
tellectual opportunities  to  a  most  undesirable  degree, 
and  that  this  is  one  of  the  most  potent  reasons  for 
the  oft-deplored  exodus  from  the  farm  to  the  city. 
When  it  comes  to  overworking  and  underfeeding 
his  children,  making  home  hateful  and  life  one 
joyless,  monotonous  grind,  a  certain  class  of  farmer 
has  no  right  to  throw  stones  at  any  factory  oper- 
ative, miner,  or  even  sweat-shop  worker.  If  Mr. 
Roosevelt's  commission  on  country  life  will  succeed 


368  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

in  reforming  or  even  improving  this  type  of  man  — 
you  all  know  him,  whose  barn  is  four  times  as  big 
as  his  house,  and  his  real  pets  and  prides  his  horses 
and  pigs  —  it  will  do  as  much  good  as  any  factory 
legislation  that  can  be  placed  upon  the  statute  books. 
What  of  the  alternative  to  child  labour,  the  place 
to  which  the  child  must  be  sent  if  he  be  taken 
out  of  the  factory  —  the  school.  As  things  stand 
at  present,  it  is  my  unwilling  judgment  that  while 
the  factory  may  become  a  sweat  shop,  the  average 
school  in  the  United  States  to-day  is  little  better 
than  a  mental  treadmill  for  the  average  boy  of  the 
working  classes  after  twelve  years  of  age;  that  the 
education  is  so  purely  formal,  so  bookish,  so  lady- 
like, so  irrational  and  impractical  in  a  word,  that  it 
stunts  his  mind,  bewilders  his  senses  and  fills  him 
with  a  dislike  for  real  education  and  training  which 
warps  him  mentally  as  badly  as  the  factory  does 
physically.  Many  a  boy  of  this  class  and  age,  as 
our  antiquated  curriculum  stands  at  present,  is 
better  off  working  six  hours  a  day  in  a  well- ventilated, 
thoroughly  sanitary  workshop,  conducted  on  kindly 
and  intelligent  principles,  than  he  would  be  in  the 
schoolroom  droning  and  day-dreaming  over  classical 
absurdities,  in  which  he  can  find  no  interest  nor  profit. 
The  motto  of  the  school  is,  "  By  books  ye  are  saved. " 
But  it  is  a  case  of  "the  letter  that  killeth."  In 
the  total,  the  school  is  probably  doing  more  physical 
damage  to  our  children  than  the  factory. 


OVERWORKED  CHILDREN  369 

What  the  boy  wants  is  not  books  but  life,  not 
words  but  things,  and  as  matters  are  arranged  at 
present,  he  has  to  leave  the  schoolroom  and  go  into 
the  factory  or  the  shop  to  get  them.  The  average 
schoolroom  is  preferable  to  the  shop  or  factory  for 
the  working  boy  or  girl  after  the  thirteenth  year 
in  but  little  more  than  the  fact  that  it  protects 
him  from  physical  overstrain,  and  its  deadening 
six-hour  confinement  at  hard  and  uninteresting  tasks 
is  a  heavy  offset  to  this. 

Not  only  so,  but  the  school  curriculum's  utter 
lack  of  appeal  to  the  working  boy  of  thirteen  or 
more  is  one  of  the  principal  causes  of  the  rush  of 
child  labour  into  the  shop  and  the  factory.  Taking 
it  the  world  over,  the  principal  cause  of  harm- 
ful child  labour  is  poverty;  the  stern  need  of  even 
the  pittance  that  can  be  earned  by  the  child  to 
enable  the  rest  of  the  family  to  live,  not  unmixed 
with  greed  on  the  part  of  a  certain  class  of  parents, 
eager  to  recoup  themselves  for  the  expense  and 
trouble  of  rearing  a  large  family.  In  European 
countries  the  value  of  the  child's  earnings  to  the 
parents  is  the  principal  motive  for  early  work.  In 
this  country,  however,  we  are  more  fortunately  situ- 
ated. Wages  are  higher,  so  that  the  father's  income  is 
more  often  or  more  nearly  adequate  to  support  the 
entire  family,  and  the  average  of  intelligence  and 
humanity  in  the  parents  of  the  working  class  is 
much  higher,  so  that  they  can  see  the  advantage 


370  WE  AND  OUR  CHILDREN 

of  giving  their  children  the  best  possible  start  in 
life. 

Statistical  investigations  of  this  point  appear  to 
have  been  made  only  upon  a  very  limited  scale.  But 
so  far  as  they  have  gone  they  bring  out  the  interest- 
ing fact  that  from  fifty  to  seventy  per  cent,  of  the 
child  labour  at  too  early  years  is  due  to  the  initiative 
not  of  the  parent  but  of  the  child.  The  causes 
alleged  by  the  children  for  their  choice  were  most 
suggestive;  while  many  of  them  simply  wanted  to 
earn  money,  to  have  more  to  spend,  to  get  on  in  the 
world,  to  buy  better  clothes,  or  went  to  work  just 
because  their  friends  and  comrades  did,  the  largest 
single  group  gave  it  as  their  reason  that  they  were 
tired  of  school,  that  they  could  not  get  on  at  school, 
that  they  could  not  understand  their  studies,  or  even, 
horrible  dictu,  that  they  got  sick  at  school  —  they 
seem  to  stand  confinement  of  the  shop  better  than 
that  of  the  schoolroom.  In  many  of  these  cases 
the  parents  were  not  only  perfectly  willing  for  their 
children  to  continue  at  school,  but  were  paying  out 
money  for  instruction  in  bookkeeping,  shorthand, 
music,  drawing,  etc.,  in  addition  to  letting  the 
children  keep  their  wages.  In  short,  the  conclusion, 
strange  as  it  may  seem  to  many,  is  almost  inevitable 
that  if  we  would  rationalize  and  modernize  the  cur- 
riculum of  our  public  schools  we  should  cut  the 
foundation  from  under  half  if  not  two  thirds  of  the 
child  labour  tendency.  In  fine,  as  our  most  intelli- 


OVERWORKED  CHILDREN  371 

gent  teachers,  our  most  thoughtful  students  of 
pedagogy,  our  physicians,  our  sanitarians,  our  child- 
labour  students,  have  united  for  years  in  declaring, 
the  most  vital,  the  most  crying  demand  before  the 
American  Commonwealth  to-day  is  to  make  our 
public  schools  educate  the  whole  child,  and  not  merely 
the  expanded  bulb  at  the  upper  end  of  him.  Train 
him  physically  and  emotionally  as  well  as  mentally. 
Substitute  the  playground,  the  garden,  the  shop  for 
the  book-school.  Fit  him  for  life  and  for  action 
instead  of  for  contemplation  and  culture;  for  service 
instead  of  superiority;  for  work,  not  for  display. 


THE    END 


THE  COUNTRY  LIFE  PRESS 
GARDEN  CITY,  N.  Y. 


This  book  is  DUE  on  the  last  date  stamped  below 


1932 


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Form  L-9-35m-8,'28 


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